


Off the Long Road

by Subtle_Salieri



Category: Avengers Academy, Avengers: The Initiative, Marvel (Comics), Marvel 616
Genre: Civil War (Marvel), Fear Itself (Marvel), Gap Filler, Gen, Medical Procedures, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Recovery, References to Drugs, References to Suicide, S.H.I.E.L.D., Self-Harm, Survivor Guilt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-25
Updated: 2014-09-16
Packaged: 2017-11-22 10:45:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 9
Words: 22,415
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/608975
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Subtle_Salieri/pseuds/Subtle_Salieri
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>From the time of the Stamford Disaster that started the Superhuman Civil War to the end of the Siege of Asgard, the carefree hero formerly known as Speedball trapped himself in a prison of self-hatred, of anger, and of six hundred spikes constantly digging into his flesh, hiding his hated identity behind the pain-powered hero known as Penance. </p><p>That's all over. </p><p>But you don't magically wake up one day and decide, "I'm okay."</p><p>It's a long process, and a long, hard road.</p><p>And that road is longer than it looks.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Wake-up Call

**Author's Note:**

> A Fill-in Fanfic set after Siege, to explain how Robbie just showed up in AA #1. The last two chapters run concurrent with his Avengers Academy and Fear Itself: The Home Front appearances. 
> 
> Completed

They won. All of them won! The Siege of Asgard was stopped! The Initiative had been taken apart. Osborn's twisted vision for the world had been written off by the heroes of the day – and that was everybody. Everywhere, there was cheer, and so much outside Camp H.A.M.M.E.R.

And God, was Robbie exhausted. It'd been – years? A long time that he'd been wearing this masochism suit, and the white-hot pain of the self-inflicted torture had finally brought him down. He stumbled in the ruins of the Initiative, his helmet falling off his scarred, bald head, about to plant his face into the concrete but caught by Butterball, God, what a great kid, what a good guy, and speaking of good people there's Vance, and Elvin, they're both here, best friends from the tail end of childhood, before all the pain –

And then his mind took a break, and went dark.

  

_"The poor boy --"_

_"Don't just pity him, you idiotic-- bring me anesthetic! This torture chamber has to come off!" frenctic geniuses don't know what to do_

_blackness comes_

_bip-bip-bip-bip-bip clinical smells invade his nose but tubes get shoved in and he loses a sense_

  _heyhe'swakingupthatshouldn'thappen_ _  
_

_rushes in his veinschill his core_

_bleary eyes seeing the same sights seen after being shot they loll back and he breathes through a tube but then its gone and someone's cleaning his arms and legs with a stinging antiseptic and he wants them to stop but he can't he tries to scream and he can't he can't and its black again as he thinks about people trying to keep him alive and how to reverse their efforts_

_and he's in blackness again_

There was a beeping, and a clinical smell, and a feeling of turbulence. From the first two, he figured out that he was in some form of hospital care. After waking up and seeing his surroundings, a small room too technological and chrome to feel like a real hospital room and, specifically, the grim-faced clean-cut military types in S.H.I.E.L.D. black and whites, Robbie assumed he was on some sort of mobile base or hospital or whatever they have. He thought, in a vague, hazy way, that hadn't the Helicarrier been destroyed? Or something. He thought he had heard that before he blacked out.

Crew-cut blonde S.H.I.E.L.D agent looked up from … the National Enquirer? She spoke into a headset in the clipped, accentless voice that you heard newcasters use. “Baldwin is awake.”

Everybody called him Baldwin just after Stamford, which he hated. He would have winced, but he had been more than a bit preoccupied with the I.V. in right hand feeding him with water and medicine. That was the second thing he noticed now that he was fully lucid. The first was that the hot pain was dull, and like an echo. He was not wearing his suit, but a hospital gown with at least a full roll of bandages underneath. There were pads taped to a few spots, and the lightheadedness, he decided, was probably due to morphine.

“Where is this?” He asked, in a voice that was cracked and unpleasant to use. The S.H.I.E.L.D agents did not answer him, but stood up and opened the door. In came three men, one of whom made Robbie desperately want to rip out the I.V. and jump out a window; First came in Reed Richards, the proud, the mighty, the loathed-by-patient; Following him came a casually-dressed Stephen Strange, who Robbie knew as a neighbor for a couple years; And bringing up the rear came a Hank Pym in a labcoat, positively squirrelly next to Richards. Robbie couldn't remember meeting him more than a couple times, but did know him. The agents let themselves out as the three doctors crowded the side of his bed.

Reed was the first of them to speak“Mr. Baldwin, it's good to see you awake. How do you feel?”

Robbie blinked at them. “What happened?” The words slurred together into a messy _whahappen,_ which made him feel stupider next to the geniuses _._

“Richards, give him a moment, he's not even aware of what went down. I'm not even sure his memory's whole, after Osborn's treatments...” Pym was almost scolding to Reed before giving his attention to the boy in the bed.

“Penance – what can you remember?”

Another blink. A sigh. A throb in his temple. “ _Everything._ I remember everything that's happened.” _Iremembuherythinthashappen. “_ And I'm _Robbie.”_ The three standing men exchanged a look. Robbie didn't particularly care.

“Of course, Robbie,” Dr. Strange picked up the conversation diplomatically. “After the victory against Osborn's lackies, according to resistance members you fought with, you fainted. You were brought by Vance Astrovik, Emery Schaub and Elvin Haliday to a safehouse, and were brought aboard this helicarrier where we removed your suit and performed surgery to remove spikes embedded in your skin.” He has a dry, clinical way of explaining what Robbie had missed while he was out, like a secretary. “The empowerment of the Norn stones abruptly stopping may be what triggered your collapse. You were also dehydrated.”

Norn stones. Asgardian stuff, he thinks. Maybe? He faces away from Richards and Strange and Pym, and thinks for a moment that would be quiet if not for the periodic beep indicating another milliliter of solution has been deposited in his body.

“Where... is my suit?” Three men take sharp breaths. Richards speaks first, again.

“I don't think I can permit you to possess that any lon--” he begins, in one of his lofty spiels. If Robbie could feel his pain he'd go after him. The best he can do is verbally tear into him, even though his voice is scratchy.

“Richards, with no respect due – Shut up. You had your chance before you and your buddies made me into a pariah,” Robbie coughs,“And I want my suit. Where is it?” His tone is like a dull blade.

“...After we took it off you, it was taken to have the blood cleaned from it.” Pym. Explaining things.

“You need to rest, Mr.Baldwin. After all they put you through.” Richards. Cheap Sympathy.

“A few people want to see you, though. Do you think you're strong enough for that?” Strange. Offering an olive branch.

“...Yeah, sure. Can I have some water?” His voice was about a slide away without a drink. Reed reached around the other two(show-off) and wordlessly filled a paper cup with water, then handed it to him.

“We'll let ourselves out and come back for some advice and medication in a bit.” Strange again. Robbie liked him the most of the three right now.

“Can you manage to come back without Richards?” He said in a voice that was smarmy, but who cared about wounding Mr. Fantastic's pride? Not Robbie. Reed looked irritated, but restrained himself. Pym and Strange caught the conversation again.

“Stephen and I can take care of your medical needs Pe – Robbie. Reed probably has work to do on other things,” Hank answered. “We'll send your visitors in.” Hank led up the rear once more, shepherding Reed out as the other scientist seethed just under the surface. Robbie grinned, which didn't hurt, but didn't feel great either.

A few minutes later, there was a loud bang of the door being violently opened in a way that aggressively defied the limits of the pressurized-gasket that kept it shut. Superheroes visiting him, then. He had shut his eyes to let them rest. A woman shrieked and a deep man's voice gasped. And then three voices said in unison, “ _Oh my God,_ _ **Robbie**_ _...”_ While a fourth, gruff one said, “Blue blazes, pipsqueak!” He opened them again. It was old friends. God, how he missed them.

Firestar wore cute layered clothing, with a cream colored jacket on top, with a shorter haircut than Robbie remembered. She ran to him, holding him as tight as she dared, stroking the fine fuzz on top of his skull, kissing his cheek. Behind her were old, best friends in uniform, Justice and Rage and Nova. Vance put his hand on Robbie's shoulder, his expression barely held together, while Elvin didn't even try, crowding around the other three and worrying loudly for his old best friend. Rich leaned helmetless over the end of the bed, looking at Robbie severely.  
  
“Robbie, I was so shocked when you showed us --” “-- How did this HAPPEN to you--” “--Thought you were dead! It hurt so bad --” “Pipsqueak...” “Are you going to be --”

“Guys...” Now that he could talk to them, and had the time to, the words got stuck in his throat. “I...I-I'm...” Angel let go, giving him a little space.  
  
“God g-guys... I'm sorry...” That was all Robbie could work out in his little voice, feeling burning shame. This sent the other Warriors into a another round of hysterics over him.

“Blue blazes, 's my fault!” exclaimed Nova, the others turning to him.

“No, Rich, how could it be your fault?” Vance questioned, his hand still a reassuring weight on Robbie's shoulder.  
  
“They sent the Thunderbolts after me when I got back from my last trip into space – I've know it was Robbie in that freaksuit for ages, and I just left! I thought I knew responsibility, but I didn't force one of my best friends to stop hurting himself.” He shook his head. “I'm so sorry.”

“No, I wouldn't have listened. And I bet you had a lot of – I dunno, intergalactic wars to stop. Junk like that,” Robbie says, dreading anybody blaming themselves for him. Nobody else is at fault. It's all him. He swallows, and takes another sip of water.

“I retired from superheroing mostly – I wasn't keeping up with everything going on,” Angel worries over all of them, “At least you're being taken care of by Stephen and Dr. Pym, they're really great, and helped me when I had breast cancer.” Robbie hadn't known about her breast cancer. He hadn't been able to keep up with his friends when he sealed himself in that prison. They all chat for at least an hour, with concern felt for the members of the resistance to the space-traveling war veteran to the gentle soul whose powers poisoned her and then back to Robbie again. It's a reunion of heavy hearts, and eventually they all splinter off and leave – most humorously Angel saying she'll miss more than one midterm if she stays much longer. (“Aw, you'd miss exams for me.”)

Justice is the last one to leave, and he asks Robbie what he's going to do next.

“I dunno, man... Look at me.” His voice is stronger after going through many cups of water. The morphine began to wear off and the pain causes his hands to tremble, and there are spots of water on his sheets. After the second spilled cup, Vance or Angel held the cups up to Robbie's lips for him. “My body's torn up, I've been disowned, I've been brainwashed for... How long? I didn't even go to college at all. My powers are still erratic. What's there to do for someone who's got nothing and can't do nothin'?”

“Those who can't do, teach?” Vance quips. He's met with an extremely unamused expression. “Sorry. Just... talk to some people, all right? They can give you options. I'll try and visit you as much as I can. Rage and I... losing all of you hurt so badly.” He hugs Robbie, gently, and then excuses himself.

And Robbie finds himself tired again, after rekindling friendships and acerbic insults thrown as geniuses, and with a heavy mind he falls asleep in one of many unfamiliar beds he's been stuck in since the day he filled himself with guilt.

At least, it's more comfortable than the beds in prison.

 


	2. Checking the Boxes

“Do you have a history of alcohol abuse?” _Tap._

Sigh. “...No.” _Skritch._

 

“Do you have a history of drug abuse?” _Tap._

 

Sigh. “...No.” _Skritch._

 

“Have you ever been sexually assaulted?” _Tap._

Deeper sigh. 

“No.” _Skritch._

 

 _“_ Do you suffer from restless sleep?” _Tap._

 

“Yeah. Sure.” _Skritch._

 

“Have your ever willingly harmed yourself?” Pause.

 

“I think you know that, Dr. Pym,” Robbie dropped the play-it-mute act, and answered quietly from where he sat , kicking his bandaged legs over the side of his bed. Psychological testing had apparently been mandated by somebody, to prescribe him drugs. He didn't want drugs. People forcing drugs on him was what screwed with his head even worse than it had been – he had been escaping from the place he put himself, he had been, with Samson's help! And they stabbed him in the foot and dragged him back down and laughed. He felt a bit sorry for Pym, though. Guy defies laws of reality, does amazing things, he doesn't get parades and awards and then gets stuck babysitting the moody freak.

 

Hank was almost apologetic. “I have to stick to the script. They're recording this, as well,” he explained, gesturing to a small nondescript box sitting on a metal cart next to his chair, returning to leaning the clipboard with the profiling test on his knees gingerly.

 

“Fine, yes,” Robbie muttered out, standing up and filling yet another paper cup, taking fragile steps like a robin testing the tension of fresh snow. The wastepaper basket was overflowing with crumpled cups. His I.V. stand labored behind him. _Beep._

 

 _Skritch._ “Have you, at any time, contemplated suicide?”

 

He sat back down, cradling his cup, picking a tactic. Saying 'no' would make him _crazier_ , right? “... Only recently. In the Thunderbolts, I did... risky stuff, okay?” Sip. “But I didn't think about it. It was about doing things right. I wasn't gonna die just because everyone hated me. But... After the invasion, it was awful. Everyone said Penance was good but – that didn't feel true. Then I was brainwashed a-and...” Sip.

 

“And I didn't want to do what they wanted. I wanted to die.” Slurp. He crumpled up the mostly-empty cup and chucked it towards the wastepaper basket. It bounced off the pile and landed at Hank's feet.  
  
“Sorry.”

 

 _Ka-klik._ Dr. Pym wordlessly set down his pen and board, picked up the cup, and tossed it more gently into the basket. It found its own niche in the pile. He picked the pen up again. _Ka-chik._

 

 _“_ Do you still feel this way?”

 

Apparently, Robbie's palms were more engaging to him than the test. He turned his hands over – some of the only unbundled, bare skin he could see, curling the fingers, balling them into fists., rubbing them at the sides of his eyes. He was tired. Dozens of questions and he was falling apart. No crying.

 

“...Yes.” A single word, whispered into his wrists.

 

_Skritch._

 

And then, “I'm sorry, Robbie.” And then, “I'm going to help you.”

 

“How? How, doc? I don't want your drugs. I've got nothing. I told Vance that I've got nothing. I'm not a hero anymore. I just want to – to jump off this helicarrier thing. If my p-powers kick in, then, ok, I'll find another way to do it. A... A bag over my head, or something. I can still suffocate.” His voice wasn't threatening, no trace of the childish _if you don't do what I want I'm gonna;_ It was tired, and it was faint, and it was matter-of-factly explaining the situation.

 

In a room buzzing with fluorescent lights and a little monitor and a playback device, S.H.I.E.L.D agents bristled with their nonlethal weaponry, an old blonde man who didn't look it spoke skeptically to his junior. 

 

“Son... I've worked with you. I trust you. But your friend is serious about it – he's no good choice to teach.”

“My friend needs help, sir. And he thinks he has no purpose. This gives him one.”

“And what if it doesn't motivate him, and he tries anyway.”

“Sir – if I may speak plainly – “

“By all means.”

“I know a lot of us superheroes have contemplated suicide. Some of us succeeded, and God only knows how we were lucky enough to have some of them returned to us. I don't want the lack of interest from the superhero community to lead to another one trying. Especially not one of my oldest friends.”

“You're a good man, Astrovik. But he needs to say, “I want to do it, and I can do it”. Not you.”

“He will.”

 

“Your powers aren't damaged permanently. I've been doing some research about it, Pen – Robbie.” Hank has a problem with not calling him Robbie. “And Robbie...” He set the clipboard aside, rested his arms on his knees, ran a hand through his tidy hair.  
  
“This is not part of the profiling test. I'm not going to – not going to psychoanalyze your reaction. But I want to tell you a few things.” Robbie decided to half-listen.  
  
“I attempted suicide several years ago, before you became a hero. I wasn't the first hero to try, and I wasn't the last. It's amazing that there are a lot of heroes who haven't tried it once. Our lives, they're much more complicated that the lives of regular people. It can be scary. Having superstrength or invulnerability doesn't make people sleep easier. But we're a strong group of people – and there are so many people in it that are just so good. We want to support you until you can stand on your own.” Hank was cheesy, which Robbie would have laughed at if he wasn't just so miserable.

 

“I understand drugs upset you. But I'm not Osborn. I won't brainwash you, and I won't prescribe you things that have awful side effects or influence the way you act. We'll try medications on you carefully. I want to give you a chance to be a hero again.”

 

Robbie lifted his legs into bed.  
  
“I don't want to be one, anymore.”

 

Hank persisted with the psychological test, and Robbie shared nothing more than a “yes” or a “no” for each question, like he was picking an answer at random. Robbie knew Hank wouldn't believe his bull -- Robbe bet he thought he was lying every time. (What's it matter if he only lied _most_ of the time?) Then he was left alone, and he banged his head against the wall until his vision was wavy, and then made a little of the cruel blue energy that came from pain. With it, he left a large mark on the wall across from him. And a man in a different room with a small monitor fretted.

 


	3. A Viable Option

“You're not going to let him touch that.”

“It might prove something.”

 

Later in the evening on that same day, there were two large, blue, determined things in Robbie's room, which made him extremely uncomfortable. This really wasn't assisted in any way by the face that the first of them – that being _Steve freaking Rogers_ – had set his Penance suit down on a table in front of him. He resisted the urge to reach out and touch the perversely-familiar helmet by lacing his fingers together. One reason for that being that Vance was the second large, blue, determined thing, and the expression on his face was pure worry.

 

“Good evening, Robbie.” Well. Somebody had warned him that he didn't like being called Baldwin. Good for them.

 

“Hello Commander Rogers,” he rasps in reply. His voice had gotten scratchy again. Both Commander Rogers and Vance went for the faucet. “No, no – 's okay.” Robbie gestured to his side table, which had a cup on it. Doing so hurt.  
  
“Thanks, though.” He thinks he meant that.

 

“How do you feel, son?” Rogers's baritone voice had a kindly tone hidden in it. “Our doctors doing you some good?”

 

Robbie thought he talked like an old movie – friendly, boisterous, obviously exaggerated for effect. Why not play along? “Oh, I'm doing just fine, Commander Rogers,” he answered in a voice that made an earnest effort at being light and cheerful – his head still throbbed from earlier.

 

“Is S.H.I.E.L.D planning on allowing me to be released soon, sir?”

 

“Whenever you feel strong enough to leave, I've made it clear that you're to be released, with all your belongings which have been in the government's possession since your arrest.” Dopey posters? An Xbox? Shorts? Nothing he had any use for there. “I would request, however, that you maintain contact so we can help you regain control of your powers.”  
  
“And, Robbie,” Vance added from behind Steve, “I think there's something you should do – but Commander Rogers won't take my word that you'd be a good choice.”

 

Robbie sighed. “Maybe you two should sit down,” he said, leaning back as they did so. Vance rested his forearms on his thighs, whereas Rogers stood straight upright, arms crossed.  
  
“Vance, what do you want from me?”

 

“There were an awful lot of kids involved in the Initiative, Robbie. Some kids who were going to be planted in it once Osborn had molded them into what he wanted people to see. Neither incarnation of the Initiative was all that good to the new recruits. Young superhumans need a school, people they can trust, not boot camp and a death sentence.” That statement was personal for Vance, after the sordid, shameful treatment of MVP after he was killed.

 

“Well, God knows that if there was some sorta _Avengers Academy_ or somethin' like that when the New Warriors started out, maybe we would have turned out better,” Robbie replied, cynically. He glanced at Steve. “Sorry.” Steve shook his head. “No, you're right – we didn't do enough for your young team when you started out.”

 

Vance continued on following this exchange.

 

“Robbie, there's no easy way for me to ask you this – Hank Pym, you know him, is creating a school for the superpowered kids who suffered under Osborn – voluntary enrollment, based in the Infinite Mansion, you'll learn about it in time, substitute staff pool of the entire Avengers roster. He and Steve have asked me to be a full time staff member of it – and I'd like to ask if you'd join me.”

 

Robbie just stared at him.

 

“Robbie...?”

 

His friend stopped gaping after another second, and then shook his head vigorously. “What? No? Are you crazy, Vance? I got powers because I snuck around where I wasn't supposed to go, I would disobey Thrash all the time in the Warriors, I got 612 people KILLED!” His voice had risen in volume and pitch, and he had kicked his legs off the bed. “I was a stupid kid who went from having a cultish fanbase over a god-awful reality show to being a masochist hiding behind a spiky helmet because the entire world hated me!” He stood up; The other two responded in kind, towering over him. “You want a scarred freak teaching kids how to use their powers and fight villains?!”

 

There was an unnatural glow in the room that Steve and Vance stared down at. It was from Robbie's palm, hanging open and loose. He looked down at it as well, clenching his fist, grimacing, and banged it against the table. “ _Sorry._ ”

 

“You could be Speedball again, Robbie. You'd be a good fit to help them do things right.”

 

He sank back down to the bed, head bowed, expression pained.

 

“Vance, how the hell am I going to help kids _not_ be like me when my main goal in life right now is to not have one?”

 

This distressed Vance; he stepped closer, and, after a moment of consideration sat next to Robbie, putting one arm around his shoulders. “No – please don't talk of killing yourself,” he whispered, softly and sadly, and then looked up at Steve. “Commander, if I could talk to him privately for a bit?” He asked.

 

“I'll give you some time alone. But Vance – don't try and force him,” was Steve's response, kind, helpful, sage. Not that Robbie really noticed.

 

“I won't.”

 

“And Robbie – whatever you choose to do, your uniform is yours to keep.”

 

The most respected superhuman in the country left them, which prompted Robbie to immediately begin speaking again.

 

“I can't do this Vance, I just can't. Pym didn't even mention this to me and he knows I couldn't do this. I'm barely an adult, man! And my adult life has been spent i-in a godamned gimp suit.” He was shaking a little bit, Vance's grip feeling more like a weight of guilt than of reassurance now. Go ahead, you're near the bottom, ruin one of your last remaining friendships.

 

“Robbie... You know what I would do if I thought you couldn't do it?”

 

“What?”

 

“I'd make sure you were healed, and then when you left here, I'd give you a room at my old apartment, help you find new clothes and a job and let you live there however long you needed, and I wouldn't force you to do a single super thing at all. But you always loved being a superhero. I think you can handle this – I think you need this, too.”

 

“ Damnit, I just don't know! People hate me –“

 

“The school wouldn't be public.”

 

“The kids would know what I did...”

 

“Robbie, Stamford wasn't just your fault.” If you asked Justice, his involvement was incidental – Dwayne and their producer had the most to do with the choice of confrontation, Nitro had been the aggravating force – but he wasn't going to try and convince Robbie of that right this second. “We'd explain it all to them. They'd learn from that mistake.”

 

“I don't...I'm afraid of being... not-Penance. Speedball. That.”

 

“I'm here for you, I'll be there for you. We can ease you into it, get you a new costume and sort out your powers, introduce you to the rest of the staff. Hank Pym is leading it – he knows people can bounce back from mistakes. And c'mon, Robbie – bouncing back is what you do.” It was simultaneous; neither of them could resist just a bare trace of a grin at that little joke.

 

There was a period of quiet, which was tense in the monitor room full of nosy agents of the government.

 

“...Okay, Vance,” he finally murmured. “You promise you're going to be there?” Vance reached out for Robbie's hand, which was beginning to bruise in purple shades, giving it a squeeze which was now reassuring to Robbie. Justice, his good old friend, Super-Tights, he had Robbie's back.

 

“I will. I'll vouch for you and I'll make sure things are okay. I just don't want to lose another old friend, and after all this... not you.”

 

 


	4. New Community

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is preferably read having read the first issue of the 2005 New Warriors miniseries.

“You've taken the job?” On the main deck of the helicarrier, Robbie saluted Steve Rogers with his hand that wasn't carrying a medium duffle, who then saluted back, which bothered him – Mr. Top Cop saluting him? He wasn't even military, though he guessed that somebody must have told him about what he did to save DC – rescuing the capital was probably worthy of a salute. Maybe. For good people.

 

“Yes, Commander Rogers. I thought for a minute... I guess, it seems like I might be able to help someone this way.” Well, maybe. Mostly he took it because he didn’t have the energy to argue with Justice, and at least he wouldn’t be alone there. “I’ll be taking the codename of Speedball again.” Also took his Penance suit, but, maybe that was just sentimental. It was pretty handy to charge up pain-based energy each day, too, he thought, as the skin on his arm pricked from a fresh cut, under a nondescript hooded sweatshirt he grabbed from his boxes of seized possessions. It didn’t quite fit right anymore, and the soft jersey was weird to feel against his hard muscles and skin.

 

“That’s a great thing to hear, son,” Steve answered with a smile on his face that seemed too glad to be part of the director of S.H.I.E.L.D. “We’re here to help you transition into normal life, Robbie – the Avengers support each other, and you are one, now.”

 

Robbie was suddenly reminded of when he first tried to join the Avengers – Steve was polite, and told him to try again in six months, a year maybe. He probably would have, but then – New Warriors, but then – Chord and Tai, but then – Vance’s murder trial, but then – the Warrior’s Trans-Sabal interference, but then – the kinetic dimension, but then – but then – but then –

 

The past five or six years all set themselves neatly in Robbie’s memory, and he finally had a personal understanding of metaphors about falling dominoes. It just never ended from time he started being a superhero.

 

“Oh yes, speaking of which,” Steve held out a card in his right hand. Robbie looked down at it and saw a recent photo of his face. Now when was that taken, he pondered, except he remembered that they’d taken a photograph of him that morning for it.

 

Sheesh, he was forgetful.

 

“Here, we’ve made your membership card. As your identity is public,” Steve said without missing a beat, “We photographed you out of costume and included identifying information, so you can use it as an all-purpose government-issued ID in everyday life. It has a signal built into it for cases of emergency,” he explained.

 

“Thanks, sir,” he said, taking it and stuffing it in his pocket. He needed to buy a wallet.

 

As Steve finished up his positive spiel about the Avengers community and resources and stuff – things that Robbie was only half-hearing – Vance came up behind Robbie, wearing an obviously-borrowed Hawaiian shirt and carrying a box.

 

“Robbie, I got them to release the rest of your stuff to me, you ready to head to the Infinite Mansion?”

 

“Sure – Commander Rogers, thank you for the card and – stuff,” Robbie finished somewhat lamely, not incredibly formally.

 

“You can call me Steve. It’s fine. Good luck to you, Speedball, Justice – give Hank and Pietro my regards when you see them.”

 

Robbie gave him a genuine-looking smile back before Vance directed him in the right direction.

 

“What happened to your apartment?” He asked when they were out of earshot of anybody else, walking through artificially bright halls.

 

“Well, it turned out that after I deserted and there was a warrant out for my arrest, my landlord broke our contract, sent my belongings to a storage site, and sold it to somebody else,” Vance answered in an oddly undisturbed tone. “I mean, I could attempt a lawsuit, but she was justified to do that, seeing as I was actually violating laws and on the lam. Additionally, Hank would prefer we all lived-on campus, with the students. ”

 

“Did you go to prison again?”

 

“No, no, we avoided being caught long enough, until the administration change. Members of the counter resistance were granted pardons. Night Thrasher was held in Camp Hammer briefly, but we got him out in our second-to-last visit there.”

 

“But Thrash is…” Robbie trailed off. Dwayne is dead, that’s it, not Night Thrasher, that’s his brother now, it’s not like they can just bring people back to life after they were incinerated. “Pietro is that guy, Quicksilver, right?” He changed the subject abruptly.

 

“That’s right Robbie,” Vance said, seeing his confusion and upset. His voice was very calm. “Hank is the headmaster, and the rest of the main faculty will be you, me, Tigra, Quicksilver, and Jocasta. You know all of them, right? Jocasta is an A.I., and she’s hooked into the Infinite Mansion. The rest of the Avengers are going to be specialist or substitute teachers.”

 

“Right, okay. That makes sense.” He knew of all them, yes, but he didn’t really know them that great. Oh well. They passed by several S.H.I.E.L.D. agents who gave Robbie hey-isn’t-that-guy-a-reckless-mass-murderer-who-never-stood-trial looks, which encouraged Robbie to pull his hood up at the next turn, leading to the ill-fitting sweatshirt exposing the lower inch or so of his back. He got taller and broader in the Penance suit.

 

“My clothes don’t fit me anymore,” he thought aloud.

 

“Hey, there’s an idea. Rage and I haven’t had a chance to buy new clothes in ages, perhaps before the Academy students arrive I can call him and see if he’d like to go shopping in the city, and we can all – well, look like normal people again,” Justice said in bright response.

 

“I miss Elvin,” Robbie murmured to nobody in particular. It can’t have been so recently that they were just normal… well, sort of normal, teenaged boys.

 

Vance they stopped at a door with a shiny, white Avengers “A” and a scanner attached to the door handle. Vance flashed it his own Avengers membership card, and it clicked open, revealing a perfectly normal hallway with linoleum and a few potted plants and framed paintings.

 

“The doors in the mansion lead all over the place, you just have to have the right one. Jocasta can set up doors to other places if you ask her to. Come on, I think everyone else is in the faculty room, to the right, six doors down.”

 

The other teachers were, in fact, in there, except for Jocasta, Tigra and Dr. Pym sitting around a table and Quicksilver reclined on a couch beside them, with rather bored body language.

 

“Six students, then, the ones who need the most help; I’d take the boy from New York, but, his parents are against it. That’s a bit of a concern – Vance, good to see you. Ah, there’s Robbie,” Pym interrupted his discussion to greet them.

 

“Oh, hi Vance,” Greer said after. Pietro just looked up from the couch and nodded to the two of them.

 

“Hey there, Hank, Greer, Pietro,” he replied, amicably, while Robbie tried to shrink away from the three sets of eyes all looking at him. “Robbie, if I give you directions, do you want to find your room for yourself to put down your things and then come back to meet everyone? I need to talk to Hank about something.”

 

“Sure, sure,” he said, listening to the directions and taking the box before departing.

 

After about a minute, Hank spoke again.

 

“You did convince him to come. I’m impressed,” Hank said.

 

“Well, it took a little bit. But I think he’s okay. He’s going to be Speedball, so, ah, that’s a good sign. Steve printed his ID card this morning.”

 

Pietro spoke in response, his tone condescending. “Are you really certain that Mr. Baldwin is in the shape to function here?”

 

“Vance, I trust you with my life, really, but… Penance is in horrible shape. He was banging his heads against things, completely wrecked when we saw him at Camp Hammer,” Greer said.

 

“He’s not Penance. He’s going to go by Speedball,” Vance emphasized, slowly, deliberately.

 

“So the Penance suit was destroyed?” Hank asked. Vance sighed.

 

“Well, no… Steve insisted that it was his property, gave it back to him. I told him not to.” Tigra and Hank shared a look. Pietro laughed hollowly.

 

“Well, isn’t that lovely, you insist the boy is fine and he looks at us like a deer in headlights, and he still has his iron maiden. But that’s quite all right – he’s going by Speedball now! How could we ever have doubted you, Astrovik?”

 

Vance folded his arms, took a few steps so he was looming over the couch where Pietro reclined.

 

“I can’t believe you three. Robbie isn’t some kind of – he’s a real person, and he’s better.”

 

Hank spoke plainly. “Vance, I administered his psychological test. I know what I’m talking about when I say it paints a very worrying portrait of him – depression, desire to harm himself, posttraumatic stress, all the results make him high risk. I was planning on trying select antidepressant medication and possibly a sleep aid, but medicine only does so much. Or, can make things worse,” he added. “Some therapy would be good, but superhuman psychologists are in short supply; Samson is gone, Trauma is AWOL, and Moonstone – well, what I’ve heard, she had a hand in destroying him.”

 

“He’s not destroyed!” He exclaimed in response, resting his left hand against his forehead. “Recovering. He’s recovering. I don’t want him to lash out at a student, or do something he can’t take back to somebody, but that’s why I’m here. Whatever risks there are, he’s too important to give up.”

 

“To what? The Academy? Or you?”

 

“Both, all right? Yes, some of this is me thinking, ‘I don’t want to lose another friend’. Call it selfish, but I’m sick of burying New Warriors, trusted friends, some of them even younger than I am – like Robbie. But think about this. Hank, you’ve been a hero for ages, and you started as an adult. Tigra, you only joined the Avengers well into adulthood, and Pietro, you started out as a villain.” He scoffed in response. “I started younger, but I didn’t join a team until I was in college. Robbie, he was with the New Warriors from the age of fifteen. That wasn’t even so long ago for him. He knows team tactics, he knows teen attitudes, he understands physics and motion and planning attacks because his powers needed that, he’s worked in crisis situations, hostage cases, in space, in civil wars. He’s a veteran barely in his twenties, he’s a guy who suffers from guilt and self-hatred and isolation, which is a problem several of the students we’re accepting have. He is vital.

 

“If you don’t think he is, then we’re both getting out of here.” Vance stared at the three of them. Greer and Hank stared back, while Pietro rolled his eyes.

 

“You have a flair for the dramatics,” Pietro chided, his tone sardonic as always. “But, let’s let our headmaster weigh in, hm?”

 

“I’m… I’m not denying that he has the experience to instruct young superhumans, you have to understand me, Vance,” Hank said. “I’m worried about him as well, and thus, his ability to do the instruction.”

 

“Well at least here at the Academy there are two people who care. That’s two more than if he’s put out to fend for himself.” Justice sank into a third chair, rubbing his temples. “I know you’re concerned, but if we can make things normal, treat him like – like he’s a real person, instead of a poster child for recklessness turned self-mutilating tool – I know he can get by, he can be one of the best teachers we have.” A lull. “I’m sorry for shouting.”

 

“I get why you’re so passionate,” Tigra said. “Hank and I are okay with him being here but… that’s mostly because we trust you. He’s just got to improve to be around kids.”

 

“He will. He’s not going to hurt himself anymore. I’m sure of it.”

 

 

 

 

 

There was a tape in the box of his belongings. He knew this tape. Underneath it was Namorita's old Empire State sweatshirt, that she gave him one year. He picked both the items up.

 

“NW-PILOT-2-00-5-10 taylor fndation cpy 3”

 

The label was written in Dwayne’s handwriting, a neat print. He had given them all copies to review and keep. Microbe took one, Nova waffled before taking his copy, ‘Nita just met the offer with an unamused “You think we got VCRs in Atlantis?”, and Robbie had enthusiastically got his copy first.

 

There was a small television in the room, with a built-in disc and tape player.

 

The room itself was very nice, the sort of impersonal comfort of a semi-nice motel chain, though without windows – seeing as the Mansion had been explained as being its own dimension, he wasn’t unsurprised. Lots of places to store and hide things in shelves and drawers and tables and a desk.

 

Robbie put the tape into the machine. Whenever it was last played, it evidently stopped in the middle at some point and then not rewound, as he immediately heard a higher-pitched, hollow, squeakier version of his voice.

 

 _“-- nice chain! My friend Vance had one just like it – now where did he get that again…”_ It was arrogant and young and full of energy.

 

_“Oh yeah. **The Vault**.”_

_“We're not going back.”_

_“Well... okay. Say, which one of you hits the hardest?”_

He hit fast forward.

 

_“Let's just hit them hard and fast!”_

_“Oh, sure. A plan would have been **idiotic**...”_

 

Fast forward.

 

_“So, how do you decide which one of you controls the leash?”_

 

Fast forward.

_“Another town cleaned up. Another life touched.”_

 

Pause.

 

He missed them. They were really dead. He knew, in his heart, that this had to have been real, but he didn't want to acknowledge it. He cried, quietly, for the first time since he regained his memories of it all. He remembered the smell of the explosion, harsh and ashy and the burning sensation . He curled his arms around himself, and felt the spot on his stomach where that girl's father shot him, shot him on the steps of the Capitol like he was some kind of villain. It felt sore like the rest of his scars.

 

“Mr. Baldwin?” A light, metallic voice rang in his ears. He looked up, but there was nobody in his room.

 

“Hello?”

 

“This is Jocasta. Dr. Pym would like to know if you plan on returning to the faculty room, and if you needed directions.”

 

“Were you spying on me?” He demanded of her disembodied voice.

 

“No, Mr. Baldwin. The Mansion's merely designed for me to know the whereabouts of its residents. There are no cameras in private quarters.”

 

“Oh. Okay. I'm coming back out, yea, just trying to organize – a few things, you know...” He said. “Could you call me Robbie?”

 

“Of course Robbie. I'll tell him.”

 

“Thanks, Jocasta.”

 

He stood up off where he had collapsed on the bed in worship off the television, took the tape out, and shoved it underneath the mattress along with the college sweatshirt, dropping the half-full box on it for good measure.

 

He breathed deeply, and took the helmet out of the duffel, and made another cut. Then he turned out the light and left what was to be his new home.

 


	5. Make Yourself at Home

“Robbie?”

 

His hands had a tendency to shake. Focusing intently, he layered them on top of each other, right thumb and fingers gripping the left thumb while the right fingers were enclosed on top by the left ones.

 

“Robbie?” He suddenly lay his hands flat on the square Formica table. Tigra was trying to talk to him, Hank and Vance across and next to him, respectively. Pietro had moved to leaning in a doorway.

 

“Right. Yes, sorry, my mind was wandering.”

 

“It's ok, Robbie. We just wanted to go over the incoming students with you this week. We'll be working on lesson plans this week for what the six of them need help in.”

 

“Sure, sure. When are they moving in?”

 

“Within a month, we're sorting out the technical aspects and communicating with their families,” Hank jumped in. Greer pushed a folder over to Robbie. “Here's the files we've collected on them.” Robbie flipped through each of their pages, scanning their powers and statistics, trying to avert his eyes when it details what Norman Osborn did to enhance their powers. He's not strong enough to read anything like that yet. The others at the table watched him.

 

“Huh, there's an couple of different energy projectors,” he wondered aloud. Their energies were a little more.... uh... lethal (electrical energy? Radioactivity? Hardcore.) but there were similar concepts in controlling how they projected it – the difference being, the need to be careful was so they didn't kill someone, not 'cause they'd bounce off the walls.

 

“Yes, Brandon and Jennifer could probably benefit from tutelage in directing how they target it from you. Speaking of which, how is control of your power currently, Penance?” Hank asked.

 

“Speedball. Or Robbie,” he corrected absentmindedly, finishing the last page. Aw, this guy can be dinosaurs. Kinda a cute power, actually. He closed up the folder.

 

“Right. Sorry.”

 

“Anyway, it's sort of complicated. I'm more... used to the pain-based powers. I don't understand how it changed, and throwing myself against a wall or something doesn't make me change like I used to.” He looked down. “I mean, I'm still a conduit for the dimension I pull this energy from, or I couldn't have any power. That wouldn't make sense.”

 

“We'll figure it out, Robbie,” Vance reassured him.

 

“Hmm – come with me to my lab after we finish this meeting, Robbie, I have some theories.”

 

“Sure. Tigra, are we all the teach-- where'd Quicksilver go?” Somewhere in their conversation, the speedster had run off – literally, maybe? The pun kinda made Robbie want to laugh.

 

“He takes off all the time if he's not involved in the conversation – he's... not a bad guy, but he's a little impatient,” Vance explained.

 

“Oh.” Weird guy.

 

The conversation carried for a little while longer, Robbie half tuned in, leafing through the pages Tigra handed him a bit more, before they adjourned. Hank asked him to follow him.

 

“Sure,” he answered.

 

Hank's lab was spacious, but the effect was cluttered by an array of complex-looking instruments and tables covered in various labware. “You wanted to talk to me about... stuff?”

 

Hank didn't turn, nor did he speak for a second, trying to think of a way to say what he meant without angering Robbie. When he did, he tilted his head downward so he could look Robbie in the eye.

 

“Robbie, I think your inability to use your old powers may be psychosomatic,” he said, in a calm, quiet voice. “Ah, that means that part of it may be mental – you may be unconsciously avoiding it, or your stress and suicidal thoughts are rendering you incapable of using it. I wanted to talk to you about coupling treatments to revitalize your powers with drug therapy. I know a psychiatrist who we can consult on what courses of drugs we should try.

 

“I don't like drugs,” he muttered, unhappily.

 

“These wouldn't take away your memory and personality – Moonstone was manipulating you, these would try and resolve some of the damage she did. You're depressed, and scared, and you're suffering from flashbacks – you told me. Do you... still feel the urge to harm yourself? Or... kill yourself?” Hank kept his tone even, but his forehead had prominent, worried lines in it.

 

The cut he had made earlier ached, the comfort he had taken from its heat now a burning guilt. His clear blue eyes blinked as he set up a lie to stick with. “Not really, Doctor Pym.” _Absolutely._ “I mean... a little.” _I did it a half hour ago. I plan to tonight._ “Having this job to focus on... takes some of the edge... off?” _I won't kill myself here because I don't want Vance to have to deal with my body._ “It's better.” He forced in a weak little, but optimistic-looking smile over his tired face. He saw that Hank's stare had moved lower, looking at the scars that circled his neck like a collar that choked him with guilt. Robbie shrugged his hoodie, the hood obscuring a few of them.

 

Hank took that explanation as acceptable, for the moment. “That's a reassuring development. It's possible you need a few jumpstarts with the power as well, instead of it being pure mental block. Let me do some digging. Did you ever visit the dimension yours derive from?”

 

“Uh, yeah. Spent at least six months in there as a teenager,” he answered, thinking about that weird time. “I mean, it’s kinda a separate place that I visited, but it’s also sort of like, my body is kind of like the structure for the dimension?” He tried to explain, a bit confused itself. “We were kind of joined together,” he personified the dimension, like it was a symbiotic relationship.

 

This piqued some interest in Dr. Pym. “Hmm. Reading Richards’ reports –“ Robbie resisted a scowl, “Your kinetic field field appeared to have overextended itself in the aftermath of the explosion, but would repeatedly manifest itself in reaction to pain, aggressively instead of primarily defensively. Your theory of the dimension being inseparably part of you, as if your conscious was part of the structure –“ Hank thought of Jan’s bond to the dimension they resided in, and his chest ached slightly, “Perhaps it was a defense mechanism to preserve both yourself and the dimension after the explosion that it couldn’t shake itself of after you had assumed the Penance identity.

 

 

“Uh, yeah, sure…” Robbie had grown uncomfortable hearing Hank speak in such a distanced, analytical (though interested) way about the past couple of years. “Maybe we can do some, like, prodding to see if the power will kick in, sometime… I mean, that’s all over…”

 

It took a second for Hank to just take the freakin’ hint. “Right, yes. You have a good understanding of your powers. Urging it to move back into the old patterns of usage should be helpful, and if we could remove any mental paralysis with drug therapy, then you’ll probably be able to use your powers at will.” Hank smiled encouragingly, even a little optimistically.

 

Cue time. Robbie imitated the smile. “That sounds great, Dr. Pym. I can deal with drugs, I guess.”

 

“We’re peers – you can call me Hank. Oh, tomorrow, I’d like to take you to Linda – Night Nurse –‘s clinic to have a physical.”

 

Blink. “What?” Wow, how intelligent Robbie.

 

“Well, you haven’t had a thorough one since age 17, according to your records – there are a couple marked that were done during your Thunderbolts tenure but all records created under Norman Osborn have been deemed, on a whole, fraudulent. You need a good one on file.”

 

“Nobody like Richards or… Stark or anyone’s gonna be there, right?”

Hank seemed to have a bit of disdain for them simmering underneath as well, going by his sharpened tone. “Of course not. Night Nurse and I will be consulting Stephen Strange. Just the three of us. You don’t mind Stephen, do you?”

 

Robbie shook his head. He’d been in Night Nurse’s place as a scrappy kid one or twice, though all he really remembered was his adolescent mind thinking she was hot. Doc Strange, he kinda liked. Helped out the Warriors sometimes. Lived a few blocks west of him. He was the most sufferable of the genius cadre on the helicarrier.

 

“That’s good. I’ll get the contact information of the tailors we work with – you’ll need a new costume, no doubt.” Robbie nodded again. “Sure, sure.”

 

Hank took on a solemn tone. “Robbie – I want you to know. We are here. You don’t need to just hang on alone. I'm not... the best at this, but you can trust me. If nothing else, tell Vance if something’s wrong. He’s so concerned for you.”

 

Hank was a good guy with a lot of problems and he was about to gain another six. Which was exactly why Robbie decided not to confide in him, like some self-centered idiot.

 

“It's fine, Dr. Pym. I'll mention it if something's wrong. Night Nurse is based in downtown New York, right? We got a door that leads to her office?” He asked.

 

“Oh, yes.”

 

“Great. I've got stuff to do in the city afterward. Okay?” He put on the smile again. “I'll be find on my own. It's just... been a while.”

 

“That's fine, Robbie. Spending time where you used to live might help ease your mind back to normal.”

 

“Right, sure, I think I'll go finish unpacking. Have Jo' call me if you need me.” Robbie waved as he left. As soon as he turned, the smile fell off.

 

His first night in the Mansion was no more restful than in the hospital bed, laying in the dark on a cool sheet alone with his thoughts and fear and labored breathing. His right hand held his helmet, his left, a blade. His door was locked. He didn't want to be disturbed by an overly-concerned Vance. He'd already been checked in on two times, and made to come out and eat dinner with he and Greer. Greer was a nice, but serious and no-nonsense woman. She'd probably go ballistic if she saw the interconnecting cuts that were traveled by lines and beads of blood. Vance would lose it. Hank would be disappointed and insist on lots of treatment.

 

He had no idea how Quicksilver would react.

 

Around what he guessed was after midnight – was their time in this dimension? – he sat up. His arms and stomach objected, and he wiped away his blood, his sweat, and his stray tears with a linen. He felt useless. He felt alone.

 

He felt hungry.

 

There was a bathrobe about two inches too small in all directions that had been in the box, and ludicrous slippers. He reluctantly donned them in case he encountered anyone. His skin prickled with irritation at having to touch a fabric. Well, screw that.

 

The kitchen was how many doors down? In what direction? Damn, he needed a map to get around this place. He sort of wandered a bit absently until he found something that seemed to be kitchen-like – it had a little table, informal and manufactured, the kind you ate breakfast at before rushing off to school or work – and after looking around a few of the surrounding rooms he found a kitchen.

 

Ah, great. Cereal that was chocolate _and_ frosted in the cupboards. It'd been like three years since he'd had anything like that, and he had loved the damned carb overload when he was a kid. The paranoid part of him suspected it had been put there was Vance, to coddle him. Well, whatever. He sat down in front of the sink and just shoved a few handfuls in his mouth. Wow, food. Food he liked. It was weird and crunchy and saturated sickly-sweet, flash-dried, air-puffed, artificially flavored grain and it was wonderful.

 

“I half-expected you to run off,” a slightly nasal voice droned. He looked up to find Quicksilver leaning on the table.

 

“Dude, that'd freak out Vance. I'd be a worse burden,” he answered through the cereal. He felt kind of normal.

 

“From what I gather, you didn't care about worrying people when you disappeared into your little masochism suit.”

 

Robbie stopped rummaging through the cereal box. “What's with you? I don't even know you, man.”

 

“Mr. Astrovik convinced Tigra and Pym that you're fit to avoid being committed, but I have my doubts. You're petrified. You're a child,” Pietro said with a bit of disdain.

 

“I just got started younger than everyone else,” he brushed it off. He was too tired to feel bad for himself and this guy was trying to piss him off. “I'm newer, but I'm a fuckin' warrior, Quicksilver.”

 

“Overconfident, Mr. Baldwin?” Pietro replied. “I think that you can't handle teaching, and heroism.” Robbie stood up in one fluid motion, his hand still in the cereal box, flapping his robe open. Purple and red scars were illuminated by the light on the hood of the stove. Noticing this, he gestured to them for effect.

 

“I dealt with this crap, didn't I? Huh? I've been a hero from the get-go. You're the ultimate turncoat, I figure, from what I know. Don't patronize me, dude.” He stalked past Pietro.

 

“Also: You think I was getting off on being that thing? You're a freak.”

 

“I'm not patronizing you by questioning the abilities of erratic child who attacks himself," Pietro answered, ignoring the personal attacks.

 

Robbie grew tired of this bait-game, slamming the the kitchen door for punctuation snacking on the pilfered food all the way to his room where he felt asleep after polishing off the box.


	6. Alive Again

Sitting in a room full of plastic chairs waiting for the doctor is one of the easiest ways to get most people’s anxiety up. Robbie didn’t defy the trope as he slouched in an oversized sweatshirt borrowed from Vance while Hank went over what seemed to be a medical chart next to him. Probably his. It wasn’t like he was actually scared, but… Stuff like this relied on honesty. Honesty wasn’t a strong suit.

 

“Robbie, can you come in now? You too, Hank,” Night Nurse ducked her head out into the waiting room.

 

“Are you ready?” Hank asked him. He nodded and they stood up.

 

“Sorry I kept you waiting so long, I was on the phone with Emery’s physician in Morgantown. Stephen’s running a little late.” Night Nurse had a friendly voice that sounded older than she looked. “So, you’re Robbie? Hi,” she said, sticking her hand out. Robbie shook it. She had a firm grip. “I’ll be your primary care physician for at least the next year, but, if you’re comfortable doing so, you are free to consult other doctors; I won’t be mad,” she joked. “We just thought that starting out with doctors who are part of the superhuman community would be easier for you to deal with, and we have a better initial understanding of the problems and conditions that might affect you.”

 

“No, of course – I’m very grateful, Night Nurse. You helped my friend when she had cancer – Thanks for that, too.”

 

“Yes, Firestar. I’m glad that we managed to help her.”

 

“She did very well, I think,” Doctor Strange had come up behind them, his shirt now a Nehru-collared light blue thing. Maybe it was some kinda supernatural scrubs. “Good morning, Robbie, Hank, Linda. My apologies for my tardiness.” They reassured him it was fine, and went into the examining room. “Let’s start with vitals.”

 

“Weight: 155. Height: 5’7”,” Night Nurse called out, which Strange promptly wrote down. “If you’re going to engage in moderate to intensive exercise – if you’re returning to superheroics, in other words – I’d recommending gaining a bit more weight. Make sure you get exercise in non-life-threatening situations,” she added, rolling her eyes slightly. “You know, some heroes, it’s like they’ve never heard of the gym.” They ran through the rest of the basics, like it really was an ordinary check-up. “Good. Good. Look into this light. Good. Tilt your head. Now face me. Use medicated chapstick on your lips. Now breath into this. Hmm, stick out your arm. Your blood pressure and pulse are rather high. I have some ideas on that.”

 

“OK, take off your shirt. I need to get a look at these scars of yours.” Robbie glanced around at the three of them, tense. “Come on, Robbie, we just want to help you,” Strange urged.

 

“Robbie? We won’t judge you, I promise,” Hank said, his tone trying hard to be gentle.

 

It was a slow and deliberately slow, but he did. The cuts from last night hadn’t been deep, so they looked like they could be a few days old. Besides, on the mass of scar tissue that was his torso and arms, who could tell there were new ones? He still felt a bit ashamed about it, though, and didn’t look up once he had shed his shirt, giving his eyes a prime view of the scabby landscape.

 

Night Nurse’s intake of breath was a sharpest of the three. “You poor kid. Those look really painful.” She reached a rubber-swathed hand out to touch the edge of the largest, which was splattered across his chest in an uneven purple-green-brown-red circle, the deepest one he'd given himself; it was like he could feel the layers of the scar tissue that had tried to heal before being bloodied up again, repeatedly. His heart and stomach lurched, but he didn’t pull away, letting a little trickle of pain from the sensation flow to his fingertips.

 

“Stephen, can you do some bloodwork and scans?” She asked while she felt the skin around his upper arm, which was wrinkled and tough from puckered scars. “I'm really wondering how you didn't develop tetanus in that suit.” Strange was standing behind him, for some reason not sticking a needle in him for the blood testing Night Nurse had ordered.

 

“His WBC is adequate, but the hemoglobin is low. RBC count per microliter seems low, perhaps as low as 4.2 million, which is outside the ideal range. We'll prescribe iron supplements.” Robbie abruptly swiveled his head as far as it could go to glance over his shoulder at Strange. “Jesus Chris --” He yelped, while Strange raised his hands away, to not spook Robbie.

 

“Now, Robbie, I'm just taking a look at your circulatory and nervous system; my tests are slightly less numerically accurate than lab testing, but faster, and we don't have to stick you with needles as many times. Linda, perform the neurological tests next.” Hank was, meanwhile, taking notes, and offering advice throughout. His purpose mostly seemed to be to gently urge Robbie.

 

Robbie's leg kicked enthusiastically to the little rubber hammer but his inability to focus his eyes on her finger was frustrating; he wasn't sure why the movement was so bothersome. He managed to turn out “adequately” almost across the board – not very healthy, not completely wrecked. Except for his skin, his 'RBC', and his head. They didn't discuss the last one, though.

 

She gave him several shots for vaccines he hadn't gotten boosters for in years, apologizing for having to use needles. She was gentle, but the sharp shooting pain was enough to let another little trickle of the power fall through his body, ready to be used. Robbie's eyes lingered on the little beige band-aid that she stuck over the holes, looking, against all the scars, like an attempt to stop a flooding broken dam with a single cork.

 

“OK, we've got a few prescriptions for you – Avengers insurance will cover them, and any visits made to me or Stephen are free; It's our duty.” She typed into a little laptop with a stylus attached, entered a few commands on the touchscreen, and popped into the next room to take a few pieces of paper from the printer. “I put the address of my recommended pharmacy on there, too.”

 

“Thanks, ma'am,” he said, politely. “Doc, thanks for your... scanning things. I appreciate your consideration.”

 

“We're here to help you recover and be comfortable doing so; It's the least I could do.”

 

They exchanged pleasantries, and then Robbie and Hank left the clinic; Patsy Walker was sitting in the waiting room, and she waved to them as they went out onto the streets of New York.

 

Wow, New York. It was bright and full of people and tall buildings, just like he remembered. He pondered where he used to live in East Village before Hank turned to him, distracting him.

 

“You have business that you need to take care of?” He asked.

 

“Yeah, I've... There's a tailor who I know, and I should put in Night Nurse's prescriptions.” He wanted to walk around free, though, was the main thing. From the prison to the mountain to the camp to the hospital, he hadn't done so many simple things for years. No pizza. No basketball. No library. No shopping. And he wanted to feel what it was like to be in the city again.

 

“Good thinking. Ah, here, if you’re going to be out, you need money,” Hank said, taking out a small bundle of bills and passing them to him, “We're working on seeing if you qualify for veterans' benefits, but – consider this an advance on your first paycheck.”

 

Vet benefits? What a weird concept. He was basically a felon. Wait, was he?

 

“Doc, am I a felon?”

 

Hank looked at him strangely, puzzled by the sudden nonsequitor question. “I’ve heard nothing claiming that; Why would you be?”

 

 _Because I was thrown in extradimensional Guantanamo and placed on the Thunderbolts as a criminal, and I’m not dumb enough to think the US legal system just handwaves that?_ “Just wondering.”

 

“Well, I was going to ask to meet you back at Avengers Tower at the end of the day – We have a door there – and if you’d like, you can ask Steve yourself. All right?” Hank tried a friendly smile.

 

“Sure, sure. Meet you there at five,” Robbie said, having a weird moment of déjà vu; The money being doled out, the reassurances, the promise to meet back with the grown-up at a certain time was oddly reminiscent of how he’d gotten by til the end of high school. It made him feel reduced.

 

Hank headed off in the direction of the tower, but for a few minutes, Robbie didn’t really walk with any intent. He ambled about the late-morning chaos of Times Square and the surrounding streets, re-familiarizing himself with the cityscape, looking up, locating spots he remembered from being a kid. Hey, that’s where Mom worked. Three blocks that way is the place I’d hang out with Elvin.

 

He distanced himself from things that gave him memories related to being a superhero. Speedball may have met Spider-man and Daredevil over in that alley, his first New York debut, and ten blocks that way may have been where the Warriors did their first real mission, but those were business.

 

Robbie didn’t want to think of the flashy business. He just wanted to be an anonymous human being.

 

He found a little restaurant, run by a guy who still had some of an old country Italian accent, with a patio and he sat there for a while, drinking iced tea and watching people. If the old Speedball had been kept from consumerism and the city and enjoyment on a whole for an extended time, he would have bounced right into it, gotten enough junk to make himself sick so that Rich or El had to make sure he got home without puking.

 

Hey, maybe Elvin was around, Robbie thought as he reached into his pocket. Oh, wait – no cellphone. Damn. He took out the roll of cash instead, flipping through the bills, all big bills; Hank must have really meant it as an advance, there was enough here to last a while.

 

Well, he could always buy a cellphone, not like New York was hurting for places wanting to take his money. He dropped the first bill he plucked out of the roll for the wait staff, which turned out to be a fifty.

 

Wading through the crowds of people on the sidewalk, he felt strangely serene; well, everyone was pushy and busy, but it was rhythmic. He helped a very pregnant woman in a suit with thick dreads find her subway card that she had dropped, and got a can of cat food from a neighborhood bogeda for a stray tabby that had afterwards taken a liking to him, and followed him about for about six blocks while he tried to remember where that tailor was located; He might as well get that out of the way.

 

 

When he was told about the reality show, years ago, he had rushed off designs in his notebook for a bunch of outfits and ran off to get them made. The guy who did it was friendly, a little skeptical, but a veteran of making uniforms for superheroes. The costumes he got for the team were great.

 

Then he got the iron maiden from him. And it was great. It did exactly what it was supposed to.

 

That made this a little bit difficult, when he found the shop. He breathed in, and out, and swallowed, before pushing the door, letting the little bell alert the tailor to a new customer.

 

“You take walk-ins?” He asked in a semi-solid voice.

 

The guy, thick glasses, shortish, kinda portly, looked and dressed exactly like someone from the 1950s, the whole tan vest and the little band on the arm, was crouched over some bright red stuff that draped well, not looking up. “One sec, I got a – I got a cowl I’m making for a – client’s costume party, you know…”

 

“I’m here for a uniform, I’m pretty sure I’d know what you’d be making a “crimson cowl” for,” Robbie answered, a tiny trace of humor in his voice. The guy looked up now, which made Robbie regret the quip, because…

 

“Baldwin.” His last name hung in the air as the old guy gave him a one-over.

 

“Eh, call me Robbie?” He asked, not impolitely. “Never really liked being called that.”

 

“…I see you on television, in the papers sometimes. US Weekly’s pretty fond of you, with the strong-silent, edgy type sort of profile. People, they preferred Constrictor.” The guy shoved the red to the side. “What’s happened? You all right? You got hair again, it looks better I think.”

 

“Yeah… Yeah, I mean, you saw the coverage of the siege, right?” The guy guffawed.

 

“Saw? In the weeks before it, I had three guys from the Hood’s gang in here each day. The other cape-tailor, nice Jewish guy, he was getting in a lot too, but he was lucky, he got the Captains America. Then I see the news right on that set,” he saw, pointing to a tiny rabbit-eared set. “Didn’t see you there, though.”

 

“I was in Camp Hammer,” he explained. “I’d… kinda gotten my mindwiped, for a while, I didn’t know anything, but then some old friends showed up –“ Robbie decided to skip the bit about Nightmare incarnate showing up, “—and I helped then shut down the camp. And now… It’s like, I’m gonna be a teacher, part of a school. Avengers Academy, we’re calling it. I can’t… I can’t be Penance for that. So I need to get a new uniform. Be Speedball again. Use those powers. Um. Yeah.”

 

The guy thought for a second, while Robbie concluded the little explanation.

 

“OK, get in here, I’ll take measurements. You have any ideas for what you want it to look like? Flashier, friendlier than your last costume. Blue, I’m thinking.” He was business now, after getting over the strange shock of seeing Robbie.

 

“Yeah… No orange on the body of it, though. Too much like the last Speedball uniform. You made the one from before that too, right? With the white goggles and the stuff?”

 

“Yeah,” he answered, pulling out his measuring tape and nodding, “Yeah I remember that one. The hood was a neat trick. You want a hood kinda like that? Maybe a little black, black gloves, shorts, that’d be good. More subtle, I’m thinking.” Robbie affirmed this, then stood stock still while the guy started taking measurements.

 

When he finished, the tailor stood straight up and faced Robbie. “So, the powers. You project energy, you absorb energy. You’ll want some points – not the sharp points – that kinda serve as taps for the energy to come out. Remember the principle with Electro’s costume that I mentioned, with your Penance suit?”

 

“Yeah, I was thinking about that. I might… still want to use the more aggressive powers I developed as Penance.”

 

“Makes sense.”

 

“You know Hank Pym’s uniform?”

 

“Cripes, boy, he’s got more costumes than Gaga crossed with Prince; He just changes them less often.”

 

“The latest one, the Wasp,” Robbie clarified. “Those shoulders of his, maybe something like that? I kinda like them,” he confessed. The other thought on that for a minute.

 

“Yeah, I could see that. One sec, I gotta get my pad,” he grabbed a few colored pens and a rectangular pad from the counter, sketching. “Now, we like the old hood with the open top, we like the goggles. Medium-blue body, darker than the last one. Break up the blue with black parts. How about – How about Some ball-shaped conduits, in the coif and gloves, with bigger ones on the shoulder pauldrons. Those’ll be reinforced.” Robbie looked over at the sketches he was making.

 

“Yeah, that’s pretty good looking. Maybe a few on the other black parts, too. Getting into it shouldn’t be a problem more than the first time, since my costumes are stored in the kinetic dimension. Hopefully. If my powers work right.” He paused while the tailor finished the sketch. “Why so insistent on orange?” He asked regarding the balls.

 

The guy shrugged. “Contrasting colors break it up. Reminiscent of your old first costume. Orange is a friendly, likeable color.”

 

“Can you make them more yellow, at least?” It was reminding him a little too much of the old uniforms. This one needed to be a little different.

 

“Sure, kid. You’re the one paying. Is this on Avengers coin?”

 

The worked out the payment for materials and time, then set up a plan. (it was cheaper than the Penance costume, at least.) The tailor said he’d make it one of his priorities and to come in within a week and a half.

 

“You’re not a bad kid, Robbie Baldwin. I have to say... I'm glad that you aren't wearing that costume anymore. I know it was all business – I never told anyone, you understand – but I still felt so guilty for putting you in that.”

 

Robbie gazed at him for a moment, but shook his head, putting on a little smile that had a weak sadness at the edges. “I put myself there. It's nothing anymore. I'll be by next week.” He waved, and left.

 

And this being New York, land of the superheroes, ran into Elvin, literally, two blocks away. He was staring vacantly up at the sky while walking, and suddenly he ran into a huge guy waiting to cross the street.

 

“Oh, man, I'm really, totally my fault --” The guy turned around, looking himself like he was going to apologize, and suddenly Robbie found himself scooped up in big, strong arms, being hugged.

 

“Robbie! What're you doing here? I was just going to buy some new clothes since I'm going back to school. You look better!” He said, his spirits lifted to see his best friend.

 

“El, I was gonna try and find you!” He was still pretty much just a shrimp next to Elvin – when they were kids, they got odd looks sometimes with this 5-foot tall scraggly haired white kid hanging out with, by all appearances, a huge, muscular black guy – , but he hugged him back until he was carefully set back down again. “I'm doing that Academy job thing, needed a new uniform, have to buy some new regular clothes too... so yeah. You're going back to school?” he asked, walking with Elvin.

 

“Yeah. They stuck me in the Initiative before I could get my diploma, but the boarding school I used to go to is making an exception for me so I can go back and finish my last year,” he said, grinning. “Might apply to Empire State.”

 

“That's great!” He was happy for Elvin. He may be amazing as Rage, invulnerable super-strong Avenger and buddy to Speedball, but he knew his friend was happiest when he was getting to prioritize a normal life over everything else.

 

They talked all the way to a department store, and there they spend the better part of an hour trying on clothing and kibitzing each other's choices, needling each other as friends.

 

“El, buddy, I know you do the stripes on the mask, but on polo shirts? Put it back.”

 

“Buzz off, dude, it's classy. When you wear Lollapalooza shirts from festivals in the 90s that you've never attended, you don't get an opinion on prep school clothing.”

“Oh, so I went to a public school on East side and suddenly that invalidates my opinions. I see how it is.” Elvin playfully swatted at him with the shirt, and a salesperson glared at them. They waited until the clerk drifted towards Linens before they laughed.

 

“Hey, this shirt's kinda nice...”

 

“That's a girl's shirt Robbie. Probably got put in the wrong place.

 

“It's not _that_ girly.”

 

“It's lavender and has a sweetheart neckline.”

 

“And you know it's a sweetheart neckline because that's exactly what a big _manly man_ like you would know. I like it.”

 

Elvin rolled his eyes. “Suit yourself. I'm gonna check out their “big and tall” section. Meet by the dressing rooms?”

 

“Sure, sure...” Robbie figured he needed to make sure the sizes he was pulling out actually fit him, so he grabbed the stuff he liked and took it to one of the dressing rooms.

 

 

He hadn't looked in a mirror in so, so long. The first shirt, he put on without noticing he wasn't facing the mirror – great, it fit him. Then he turned around to look at it.

 

His eyes had such heavy bags, and there were still faint scars fading on his face. Maybe he was imaging it, but his nose looked different, and his irises looked darkened by veins of red that filled up the white of his eyes. He tried smiling, and it pulled all funny on the lower half of his face. Everything looked weird about him. Was that him?

 

“When did I get so old,” he muttered, turning away from the mirror, pulling the shirt off without even judging how it looked on him – he was frightened of the stranger that reflected back. Now that he was in New York and he was hanging out with his best friend, he should be normal and youthful and bright-eyed and cute. "And broken-looking."

 

He wasn't very careful, and when yanking the shirt off, his nails(which he had been remiss in keeping cut and tidy) dragged abruptly across his slowly-healing chest, like needles trying to plow his skin. The painful sensation made him pitch backwards, hitting his head hard on the mirror and sliding to the floor.

 

He sat there on the floor for a few minutes, his head bowed, , hugging his knees to his chest with one arm while the other hand ghosted over the bump. He looked over his shoulder to see some of the purple-undertoned scars across his shoulderblades in the mirror. There was hardly an inch of his body unabused. He heard his mind whispering,  _You are the failure. You are unlovable. Untouchable. The only way to last long is to pretend you're okay. Not loathable._

 

He was repulsive.

 

The lavender shirt was nice, but some of the blotchy scar would display over the top of the neckline. No t-shirts. No sleeveless shirts. Hooded jackets, sweatshirts and turtlenecks were ok. He could never go shirtless. No shorts. No sandals. Stuff his hands in his pockets as often as possible.

“Sir, you seen a short guy with short, sticky-up blonde hair? He was going to meet me in front of the dressing rooms.” Oh.

 

In a minute, he was tapping on Elvin's shoulder, acting. “Heyy, buddy! Sorry, I got a little caught up admiring myself in the mirror, you ready to go?” _No way I can dump on Elvin. Never. I never want him to cry over me again._ He grinned, and his friend grinned back.

 

They spent much of the rest of the day together; Robbie gets his prescriptions, Elvin points out places they used to hang out, and they forget sadness for a few hours.

 

“See you later, then, Elvin,” Robbie says outside of Avengers Tower.

 

“Definitely, man. Keep in touch. I've missed you.”

 

“You too.”

 

He scans his card, and walks into the lobby. Hank is talking to Tony Stark across the way. Oh joy. Robbie just waved to Hank and sits down, until another voice interrupts his solemn, lone wait.

 

“You're the new guy working for Hank, right?” It's Clint Barton, dressed like he did when Robbie was a kid, as opposed to the weird ninja getup. He sat next to Robbie. “Rob, right?”

 

The new guy? Not the menace, not the criminal, not “Mr. Baldwin”?

 

“Yeah. People call me Robbie.”

 

“Right, that's it,” Hawkeye responded, snapping his fingers. “Your besties saved my ass back in the day when they were in the Avengers. You guys were about twenty times better than I was at kicking off your careers as heroes, later mistakes or not. Maybe fifty times. Least you never got Iron Man blasting you.”

 

“Oh, man, totally wrong, we did pick a fight with him once. Buncha dumbasses we were. Still don't know why he attacked us,” Robbie shrugged.

 

“You could ask him,” Hawkeye gestured.

 

“No way. He probably doesn't even remember that. Besides...”

 

“He's kinda a giant prick?”

 

Robbie has to restrain a gleeful cackle. “You sure you won't piss him off by saying that?”

 

“Psssht, he's known me so long he pretty much ignores what comes out of my mouth. You'll learn to. I'm gonna help out Hank with the Academy some, I mean, I'm a “what not to do”, walking and breathing.”

 

 

“You don't seem too bad, Hawkeye.”

 

“Call me Clint, like I said Rob, you'll learn.”

 

An elevator chimes and out steps Steve, in that really classy uniform. Clint waves. “Hey, Steve! Let's get some sparring in now, I was waiting here with my new buddy.”

 

“Ah, Speedball,” Steve says in his strong voice. “I see Clint's been keeping you company. Has Hank gotten you familiar with what you'll be doing at the Academy?” Clint and Robbie both stood up as he approached.

 

“Yessir. I'll be getting a new costume in time for the arrival of the students.” Behind Steve's head, he sees Hank peeled off from Tony, approaching him.

 

“Ah, Rob, man, drop by here or the Mansion when you get it, I gotta see,” Clint butts in. “Is the old Italian guy making it?” Robbie nodded. “That's beast, man, you'll look every inch an hero, and whatever like that.”

 

They say goodbye to each other politely, and Steve and Clint head off together.

 

“Kid doesn't seem too bad. I thought someone being a little friendly might help him chill out, cause he looked about as strung out as a wet cat.”

 

“He's a good person. It was nice of you to offer a branch like that.”

 

“Hey, he needs it.”

 

 

 

“Hank, hi. I got the prescriptions and everything done today. Was.. um, your day good?” Social etiquette was still a little clunky.

 

“Just fine, P-- Robbie. You were making Clint's acquaintance?”

 

“Yeah. He seems nice.”

 

“He's a very good man,” Hank replied, tucking his clipboard under his arm. “It's been a long day. Let's go home.”

 

Home. Yes. That was home now.

 

“OK, yeah, let's. I think I'll be ok. This teaching thing'll work out just fine.”

 


	7. Ready to Go?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter has a short sequence about dreaming that teenaged characters have died, but it's just dreaming.

Every night the week before the kids began to trickle into the Academy, Robbie would have a nightmare about one of them getting killed, in combat, in a training exercise, in something. All he knew about them was their powers, their face, and their name, but his mind filled in the blanks, their voice and and their personalities and their interests and their family, bringing ghosts into his mind. One dream lead to his casual deflection of gunfire putting a slug directly in the heart of the electricity projector, Brandon. The next night gets one girl, Finesse, killed by falling debris that he _should_ have _stopped_. He guides the shape-changer through an obstacle course where they take a wrong turn that gets the student decapitated. The metal boy drowns due to negligence. A scuffle with some faceless villain on a rooftop leads to the radioactive girl falling to her death _when he should have stopped_ it. The girl who chose the name Veil is dissipated into nothingness while he watches, helplessly.

 

Sometimes these dreams are followed by ghoulish visions of Moonstone, violating his body, mind, and spirit, the cruel self-absorbed monster everyone must know she is and doesn't care that she is. Occasionally she's accompanied by Osborn, occasionally Osborn breaks his will alone, and sometimes Taskmaster tries to take control.

 

The closest to the good dream he comes is one where he resists Taskmaster by punching him repeatedly. A few of these dreams end in a gasping suicide. He starts his waking hours with his blood, and tries to ignore it by following Night Nurse's prescription of non-combative exercise, locating in the mansion a simple gym without robots and lasers and stuff like that, instead filled with punching bags and balance bars and normal ways to train. Normalcy is something to strive for.

 

Pull-ups. Push-ups. Uppercut. Roundhouse. Right hook. Waking at four-thirty in the morning or so, he goes to the gym to punish his cruel, nasty thoughts with aching muscles and focus and an attempt to clear his mind of dreams of failure. He stays at it for hours, shirtless, and unwashed and sweaty and twitchy.

 

“You been here f'r a while...?” One morning, a few minutes shy of seven o'clock or so, Vance stumbled into the gym, wearing oversized(on him, even!), cotton pajamas, carrying a couple mugs, trying to shove uncombed hair out of his eyes. Robbie seized up mid-punch, and grabbed a sweatshirt from where he had slung it over a pull-up bar, yanking it over his head, over his scars. “Coffee? Kinda cooled off...”

 

“I've been waking up earlier to get back into normal shape. It's cool.” Normal. That was an important word. “Thanks,” he said, taking a cup and gulping half of it down. He never really liked coffee before, but he didn't mind it now.

 

“You want to do some sparring?” Vance offered, drinking from his own cup.

 

Well, Night Nurse specified non-combative exercise. On the other hand, he was going to have to get use to intentionally hitting softer, if he was going to spar with teenagers.

 

“Sure.”

 

They didn't talk much as they sparred. Robbie would try and get in a kick, Vance would deflect it, but gently, and then take a swing at him, Robbie dodging it pretty easily, the pads of his feet bouncing against the floor as he repeated the action, slightly differently. It felt like Vance was taking it easy on him, like he was afraid of making contact.

 

“I think you need more coffee, this is pretty sluggish,” he quipped lamely, ducking underneath a lazy kick. “Come on, we're not kids. You'd hit me harder than this when I _was_ a kid.”

 

“Robbie --” Wow, that was a little faster, by a hair. “-- You still _are_ a kid to me.”

 

“Too late to think like that.” He glanced a blow off Vance's shoulder that was intended for the sternum.

 

“I feel guilt, over just letting you be – be _used_ like that though. I should have done something.”

 

“Cut that out,” Robbie ordered, feeling a pit in his stomach.

 

Vance slowed down and tried to look Robbie in the eye, though the shorter fighter was dodging around too much too do so well. “Cut what out?” He asked.

 

“Feeling guilty over me. There isn't anything you could have done that wouldn't have ended crappily. It's over, it's done, and it's my responsibility. Just don't.” Robbie punctuated the ultimatum by landing a punch where he meant to, square on Vance's cheek. Vance stumbled backwards and reflexively swung his right fist upwards, and it managed to make contact directly with the underside of Robbie's jaw.

 

“Shit!” was the most eloquent he could work out, and his vision was really weird, like it was – smeared? High-speed camera blur? It took him a second to realize that the fuzzy eyesight was the byproduct of being thrown backwards by the excess force, and then coming back at Vance, skidding himself to a halt by grinding the ball of his right foot against the floor. A few of the weird bouncy balls had come into being and settled around him for a second before popping out of existence. His jaw didn't really ache at all. Maybe his powers did just need a break, and were like, hey buddy, let's get bouncing again!

 

“I – didn't mean to do that, are you OK?” Vance said, his voice panicky. Robbie grinned at him, and gave him a gentle punch on the bicep.

 

“Look who's bouncing back all ready, man. I'll be great.”

 

 

“You are doing fairly well. Are you taking the medication?”

 

“Yessir, Dr. Pym,” Robbie answered. Well, some of it. The tranquilizer he dropped completely after the first day after he felt sluggish and personality-less, it just wiped him out. He hated it. The ones for night terrors didn't help a whole lot, but he still took them. That one took time. He just hated the one that did dope him up so much that he wasn't himself. They promised they weren't trying to do that, so he bet they wouldn't mind. “Why did you want an X-ray done?”

 

“It's not so much an X-Ray as a scan for variant levels of stored energy within your body.”

 

Robbie rolled his eyes from where he was laying down after some weird science scan. “OK, what was that for?”

 

Hank turned a monitor towards him; on the screen was a recognizable, X-ray like scan of his body, with... weird white clusters at points. “You seem to have points in your body where excess kinetic energy congregates until it's used. Think of any impact or – pain...” He flicked his gaze downward, at a paper, “as your experience as the production of energy, like a mitochondria, but these points where it collects itself as the electrochemical cell that a battery holds its power in until it's connected to an active circuit that allows it to be released – essentially further impact or you willing the energy out being an “on” switch,” he explained in mixed metaphors that irritatingly forced Robbie to recall two separate high school science classes. “Well, that's not entirely accurate. Really, it's rather inexplicable. I could try and delve into the research Richards did after your gunshot wound, but the understanding of how energy is stored like this is limited... The way your body deals with it effectively treats your entire body like a single cell. Fascinating, but unusual.”

 

“Well I mean – I don't need a science experiment about this...”

 

Hank put the paper he was studying down, and smiled, cautiously. “That's fair enough. What's important is your positive recovery and the renewal of your powers.” Robbie mimicked the smile, which he was getting pretty good at doing.

 

 

 

“OK, so you got a costume. How's it feel?”

 

The shoulderpieces were a little heavier than Robbie would have imagined, but peanuts next to the rig for Penance. He had talked tailor down regarding the balls to a deep, deep yellow. It felt – strangely normal.

 

He gestured to the fabric-cutting table. “May I use this?” The tailor shrugged a yes, and Speedball laid his hands flat on it and vaulted it, landing smack on the hard carpet, on his ass, for a millisecond until he bounced back to a standing position, leaning almost cockily on the table. He'd cut – just a little bit – the morning, and he could feel some of the clustered-together stored-up energy trying to get out, so it let it. The conduits crackled a pale blue as he let a tiny, tiny bit of energy out, to make the door to the dressing room flap dramatically.

 

“Great craftsmanship.” He hit his fists against the table, willing himself to go back to normal. As always, he was a couple inches shorter as Robbie than as Speedball, like he was before everything. “It's stored up safe.” He shook the tailor's hand, and walked out into the cool fall air of New York.

 

“Don't ask me to make any more costumes with spikes, you got it?!”

 

 

 

It was the day the school came into session. Robbie was clever back in the day, so he never worried about the beginning of school. Now he did when the student had to teach.

 

Vance was quiet, but sat with him a while when he was feeling too nervous to really do anything, before leaving to give some talks to the students over the first day, when there were no classes, when they were getting the kids situated and making sure they were comfortable and everyone could find their rooms. Robbie willfully spent that time persona non grata, not wanting the kids of get a premature glimpse of the bouncing screwup before classes.

 

“Robbie, I swear, this'll be good for you. You'll be great for it, too.”

 

“It's fine. I'm doing it. Too late to back out now.”

 

“OK, so you're sure you're all right? You ate breakfast today, right? You're going by Speedball?”

 

“Yes, Ms. Grant. I mean, Tigra. It's great. Everything's great.”

 

“Don't have a tantrum in front of the students.”

 

“Good luck to you too, Quicksilver.”

 

“We all support you, Pe-- Speedball. I'm certain this will go well. You want to go bring them in here?”

 

“Yes. It'll be fine. I can do this.”

 

 _Go get it, you screwball._ He stepped out of the atrium, dressed up in the silly, friendly spandex, to get kids in silly, friendly spandex, to help them. Fix his life and theirs.

 

He could do this.


	8. Try

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Runs concurrently with Avengers Academy 1-10.
> 
> Special warning for forced outing of self-harm, and mind control (brief).

Oh jeez, two of the kids were discussing Justice when he began to approach the practice room they were waiting in. He heard the girl who was calling herself Veil speaking in a very flustered way about a crush she had on him, and Striker was snarking back at her. God, that kid already seemed like a prick. Now he was wondering aloud about who the other New Warrior(him) on the staff was. God, that was such a stupid, immature name, why did they ever –

 

“Um, hi,” Robbie heard himself suddenly saying when he stepped through the door. The kids stopped nattering about things and starting gaping.

 

“I'm Pen --”

 

Wait, damnit, no that's not right –

 

“Sorry, _Speedball_.” There it was. “Justice and I'll be leading the sparring session.” Maybe try being funny.

 

“Just wanted to introduce myself before the, you know, punching.” OK, that was lame.

 

“Doctor Pym wanted to say a few words before we get started. So, uh. Let's all head to the atrium, okay?” God, he sounded like one of those toolish casual-buddy-buddy substitutes who he rolled his eyes at in high school. He couldn't stand to look directly in any of their faces, maybe feeling... scared? He was just uncomfortable. He turned away so he didn't have to deal with the issue of where to let his eyes linger, and lead them in the direction of the atrium. The kids tried to keep their gawking and scrutinizing commentary on him down, but the halls echoed enough for him to hear some of it.

 

“ _Damn. Speedball? Really? The guy who...”_ Yeah, yeah, kid, you think I don't know.

 _“...A guy he was fighting did.”_ No, it was me. My fault.

 

 _“...Cause Speedball was_ _ **stupid**_ _.”_ Yeah, that's what I am, stupid, worthless, bad at everything but screwing things up, stupid Speedball...

 

 _“He's perfect.”_ Glad someone thinks he's good.

 

“... _One wrong move and any one of us could be a murderer.”_ Yeah, that's all I am. Murderer. Killer. Terrorist.

 

 

He stopped listening to anything until Hank began to talk. They had had this discussion, and Robbie had practically been shouting it: _They shouldn't know they're the at-risks. They shouldn't know we think they'll end up worse'n even me.(Don't say things like that, Robbie.)_ Hank delivered a speech promising of the kids potential, and then he introduced the staff. Only the bit on him stuck out.

 

“Justice and Speedball founded the New Warriors when they were your age. They've been down this road. They'll help you replicate their successes... and avoid their mistakes.” Stamford. That's _the_ mistake. I'm the screwup. How's Vance got any mistakes to own up to?

 

 

Oh, Hank finished his speech. Into the skirmish room with them.

 

“We'll do fine in there, all right? We're just testing their ability to fight as a team. You cover my six?” Vance put a hand on his shoulder as they herded the kids in.

 

“Yeah, sure, I've got it. Don't get any headaches.”

 

The sparring started out well. The kids were a little clumsy, but most of them cautious to start with. Robbie started off just soaking up their attacks and directing them towards the robots that were also in the exercise. He hadn't bothered to cut today, since he knew he was going to get banged up in there.

 

Striker started whining soon enough, complaining that training was kid's stuff, that he could anything without this practicing sort of crap, that he could go out in public and be in fieldwork. Robbie wanted to stop the fight right there and shake the kid by his shoulders, _You idiot, no, that's the sort of shit I pulled, you can't be like me you attention-starved baby, shut up and learn._ Then the kid struck him with a low-level charge while he was upside down, and the nerves in his back seared in pain.

 

He settled for a just giving the kid a flippant put-down and sending the pain right back to him. The teenager writhed. _I still dunno what that does, but it's not nice to the receiver._ The kids did mostly okay, overall. Robbie got in one good punch to Finesse before she figured out how to block him, so, hey, quick learner. Out of the corner of his eye he caught Hank and Tigra deep in discussion. Every so often, it seemed like they glanced at him.

 

“I'm turning up the difficulty.”

 

And then out of the corner of his eye he saw Hazmat pull off a glove and –

 

The next moment he found himself impulsively restraining her against the wall with his powers and the moment after that he found himself screaming in her face, how dare you, how dare you, what is wrong with you, you want to be a HAZARD, you want to KILL people, and he feels Justice's hand on his back and hears the gentle voice that Justice uses to reassure him slip away and be replaced with something that's hard and authoritative and that spooks him out of the berating he gives to Hazmat and then he just slinks away. _Take a break, right, ok, yes. Sure._

 

And then Quicksilver tries to start something with him

 

“...After all, he's not much older than --”

 

“Huh?” His head hurts and he wants to go home, play hooky from school after his mom's left for work and prop himself up on his bed with Niels and watch the adult channels and yell at people on some stupid FPS and not think about this but godamnit of course Quicksilver wants to start something.

 

“Leave him alone, Pietro.” Well wasn't it nice of Ms. Greer Grant Nelson to come to his defense from the prick, but he was still pissed. He went after Pietro, shoving him against the window.

 

“We _have_ to lie to them. If they ever find out the truth about themselves,” he began, before turning away, wanting to avoid looking at people again, “They're going to _hate_ themselves and _blame_ themselves and think they _made_ themselves into the high-risk cases, the gonna-fails.”

 

“Now, Robbie, you can't be sure of that... “ Hank interjected.

 

“The hell I can't,” he brushed off the comment.

 

“And what gives you the authority? Did you develop mind reading powers in your little torture chamber?” Pietro had a smarmy voice.

 

Robbie glance around the red-tinged observation room, then hauled them off to a corner of it that the kids couldn't see from the practice room, and hissed in Pietro's face, gripping him by the front of his costume.

 

“ _That's how I coped with being told that sort of shit, you fucking idiot.”_

 

“Well, perhaps you should have higher expectations of them than for yourself.”

 

A fist flew at Pietro's face. It missed about half of its target. The speedster almost laughed.

 

“You really think you can hit me?” Suddenly the hand holding the costume glowed blue, then orange.

 

“Hell, yeah. I can take away your momentum or give you enough to throw you off and make you break your smarmy face by crashing into a wall. You want to go at it?” He hid the shakiness in his voice behind his tough guy act, before finding Hank Pym shoving the two of them apart.

 

“Speedball, maybe it was a bad idea to start your teaching in a combat exercise. Go take a break , and we can start you teaching some more traditionally-set up classes.” Hank had been gentle with him previously, but everyone(except Greer) had their teeth set against him now. Because he'd gotten violent with a student.

 

“Right. Okay. Sure.” There was no excuse. He just left. He just lay on his bed. He just tried not to cry. He hurt himself.

 

 

The students were a little receptive to his lessons, he thought. Maybe they were. It was hard for him to tell. He still felt them watching him, like they expected him to crack.

 

 

Vance had arranged the field trip. Robbie recommended it. About a half hour after he recommended it, where and to who he was going struck him and he locked himself in his room, hyperventilating, curled up on his bed in the dark trying to calm himself down and not doing it very well. Vance knocked on his door a little before midnight.

 

“You didn't come out for dinner. Are you okay?”

 

Silence.

 

“Robbie?” Several sighs.

 

“I hope you sleep well,” his voice said softly, And then he walked away.

 

 

 

The gentleness had returned to Vance's voice.

 

“Robbie, you don't have to do this.” It pleaded, don't punish yourself, not more, I want you to be happy.

 

“Yeah. I do.” He elaborated about how important it was, to face demons, and make up for it, he played to Vance's trademark sense of justice. Vance held his arm around him reassuringly, saying he wasn't alone, standing all of a centimeter away when he didn't realize Robbie's mind built walls between him and other people, stories high, miles wide. Vance couldn't see other people's walls for his own.

 

Robbie breathed, and he cut, and he wiped away the blood as quick as he could before joining the gathered crew headed to the Raft.

 

 

 

Killing people was something that, usually, made him sick. But God, he wanted to _kill_ Moonstone. She delighted in breaking people. When he remembered what she did to him, he almost vomited. Norman Osborn, okay, you had to get in line to take out your aggression and hatred for him, but Moonstone, she had a way of making amends even with her cruelty and brutally manipulative honestly and for all the bravado and swagger and confidence he could put on against her, she drove him back into self-doubt after only a few sentences. He retreated from the discussion, gripping his hand over the day's cuts to make them pinch more and to not shake.

 

And then the lights went out.

 

When they were on, Veil, Hazmat, and Mettle were gone. _Where did they go why did they go is it my fault_

 

They went out to try and find them. And then the next moment, he and Tigra had each taken a hit in the back from Powderkeg. The pain burned, and he lashed out at any and all prisoners that came in his path, until they found the kids again, and then it was just a brawl between the teachers the prisoners. It was freeing, sort of – he didn't have to be gentle. These were _bad_ guys. He left a few twitching on the ground after some aggressive blunt-force attacks.

 

“Robbie, you're bleeding.”

 

His costume had gotten a bit torn up. Nothing the kinetic dimension couldn't fix, but still. It showed off a few scars, and it reopened the morning's cuts.

 

“Huh? Oh... That's nothing,” he managed to get out, “Just a scratch.”

 

Just a scratch. And then another. And a few more. Maybe a few slashes. Add a puncture or two. They'll just be lost on the broken skin.

 

 

 

If he's near other people, he's scared for their safety. Whenever something upsetting happened, he would just retreat to his room and hold his cat and sit in the dark and pretend there was no Penance costume or helmet or pocket knife from when he was 13 in the room. After he found out the kids went public to defend themselves in Times Square – Times Square, seriously?? They couldn't have picked up a more public place if they tried – he hid in his room until the next afternoon. And he did cut. Soon enough people would know _he_ still existed.

 

 

They did a media day. Robbie brushed off everyone who wanted a “statement”. There was no statement. Who cared about 70% positive popularity polls, about strangers approving or disapproving him. He was the failure who had to do better, there was nothing pretty to say for a 6 o'clock soundbite.

 

 

Mentallo took control of their motor and mental functions for three and a half minutes. Robbie's spent months with his mind broken, lost a year of his life in a dimension irreconcilable with their own. Three minutes of tussling with Mettle that he doesn't remember shouldn't be much to him. But it freaks him out and he just herds the kids back and avoids the tough job of actually _helping_ one of the students, leaving that to Hank and Greer and Vance like a useless jerk. He tells the kids that the rest of the afternoon is theirs to use as they want, and he retreats to the gym to work out the fear of possession, loss of control. It used to be that he couldn't be mind controlled, period, at all. When he was a kid, even. But then, that was when he wasn't a failure.

 

 

“...The New Warriors mafia sticks together.” Robbie suddenly finds himself wondering what the hell is wrong with Greer that she's speaking derisively of a group she sort of joined and accusing one of his closest friends who had been an ally of hers for ages of being a freakin' pedophile. He speaks his mind in a reasoned way, a way that makes Hank half-smile in approval. He's kept outbursts like his explosion at Hazmat down to just about nonexistent, keeping his rage and upset focused on himself. Besides, they're kids, and this mistake didn't hurt any civilians. Bad judgment call to go on a revenge bender with the Hood, but no harm in the long run.

 

Tigra doesn't see it that way. She takes it personally – maybe she's upset that she didn't get to do it herself? Maybe she's genuinely concerned about the kids doing what she did and is bad at expressing it. Either way, Robbie finds himself avoiding having to be around her – she was gentle and stuck up for him when people like Hank doubted him, and all he wanted now was to avoid her claws. Eventually the matter gets settled, and he offers his own encouragement and positive reinforcement sort of stuff to her, saying she handled it well in the end and the like, because he sometimes manages to remember that he's not the only screw-up here, all of them are, kinda. At least she takes it and doesn't throw around more accusations.

 

 

 

“ – Stamford. Oh. Oh, my God, what did I say?”

 

The blood drains from his face and he tightens his hands into fists, taking a deep breath. Everyone around the holodeck-style class room, even that smarmy prick Striker, looks horrified, and appalled. Vance is just frozen, slack-jawed, as he was about to say something before the atom bomb didn't-think-before-she-acted comment from Veil dropped.

 

“Everyone, really, it’s okay.” He couldn’t believe that he felt calm saying that, but he did. It wasn’t okay, but it had to be for the students. He kept his voice even, and managed to not shake. It wasn't Veil's fault, really. She was a kid who didn't understand, and she wasn't guilty of anything – he was. That's the only reason what she said was inappropriate according to other people, because they wanted to coddle him.

 

“You've been in touch with them. Do you think tomorrow would work?” It's weird, to casually talk about taking a field trip to Stamford. Vance's response was the usual sort of calm, metered statement that he makes instead of prying into what's wrong, a good face to put on. The kids are solemn until Robbie leaves. Through that day, he makes his usual cuts, to stay powered, but he cuts a little deeper. The night is full of screams, and so he stays awake as much he can.

 

 

It's the usual story. The usual rundown of what happened, where, when, why, how, and who. Everything that he broke. Everything that was somehow his fault. Some of his heart went out a bit northeast of where they were standing, in front of the memorial, thinking of the house his father surely must still live in, of this town being a place that was never his, even if he grew up here, in the nice and quiet and small-time part of town. He thought of the dead and the living who were worse off because of him. He thought of Namorita and Dwayne and poor fucking Zachary, the stupid unlucky seventeen year old who Dwayne cared for out of the goodness of his heart, and what happened. Waste. You could say that he'd helped hundreds of people in his entire career, you could say that the X-men ruined this town or the Avengers destroyed something else or what all else, but it didn't matter. Everything should be on him! Forever! 612 people and the people they knew! All of that was on him.

 

And then some godamn stupid idiot supervillains decide to crash the “don't fuck up” lesson.

 

The kids can't handle it. Justice can't handle it. Nobody can handle it. Come on. They're two New Warriors in Stamford and a bunch of complete rookies. About fifteen seconds after the “Cobalt Men” show up, Robbie blanks out for about three seconds, during which time he lays them flat with a burst of his power that's probably nearing what was referred to in his Thunderbolts file as “Hulk-level”. Vance comes closer to commend him and –

 

“ _He's_ _ **cutting**_ _himself!”_ He freezes again. No. No, he's not. He's okay. It's harmless. She's crazy. Something. Anything. Oh, thank God, a local policemen. He has a certain rapport with the guy, even though he seems to have grown to the opinion that Speedball wasn't responsible like Nitro was. Well, whatever.

 

He takes a long moment with the memorial.

 

 

 

 

“Take off the gloves.”

 

“No.” Robbie sits uncomfortably in Hank Pym's lab and being towered over by its owner and Vance.

 

“Take them off. Now. You said you weren't cutting.”

 

“It won't prove anything, Vance.”

 

“ _Robbie_.”

 

Hank clears his throat and speaks. “Robbie, have you been harming yourself?”

 

“Define harming myself.”

 

Vance almost loses it. “You _know_ what HARMING YOURSELF is! You know it! And you HAVE!”

 

“Justice, I think you need to step away, you're upsetting Speedball and yourself.” He turns back to Robbie. “What I mean is, have you been intentionally cutting, bruising, burning, or otherwise inflicting pain or mutilation on yourself.” The questioning explanation is more of a statement.

 

“A little.”His voice is quiet. “Only a few more cuts.” Vance looks heartbroken.

 

“May I ask if you know a specific reason that you are?”

 

A laundry list floats in Robbie's mind. I can't feel quite right without pain. It reminds me to not take happiness for granted. There's so many cuts already. I hate myself. I don't know what to do with myself. I need to be institutionalized.

 

It's _justice_.

 

“My powers. They run on pain.”

 

Hank again. “Is that all?” He asks, in a tone that doesn't say, is this a waste of time, but seems bothered by this answer. Vance reaches out to touch Robbie's shoulder, gingerly, as if contact will make everything worst.

 

“Some of it might be mental... problems... stuff.... things,” he adds ineloquently. “But the kids don't need to hear anything about that.” Robbie reaches his hand, still gloved, still his, and puts it over Vance's, looking up with pleading eyes that say _I'm sorry I'm screwed up. I'm sorry I'm not right._ He does feel sorry, saddling them with his problems.

 

“No. No, they don't. Only what you want to tell them. But something should be said.”

 

“It's just my powers. That's it.”

 

Hank talks a bit about how he can work around that, and that there's more psychological treatments, and don't hide this, and all that caring that Robbie doesn't think he deserves. They then go out to a common area, and Robbie vomits up some reasonably-convincing dismissal of it, a little acknowledgment but mostly just feel-good fluff, Hank's hand on his shoulder to support him – he suddenly has a moment of deja vu to the time they fought Juggernaut with Thor, and Thor put his hands encouragingly on his and Dwayne's shoulders. 2 out of 5 original Avengers have giving him a reassuring shoulder-pat – hey, not a bad record. He grins, inside.

 

The kids seem to be a little less expectant that he's gonna go nuts. Good enough for him. He teaches a class about applied geometry – what certification does he have to teach math, good lord, what a weird school – and the rest of the day goes well.

 

Justice only talks to him once in the day, shortly before they shut down for the night. Robbie's already out of costume, and Justice comes up to him, in the hall.

 

“I'm sorry I didn't help you more.”

 

“No, it's not you...”

 

Justice's voice of full of sadness, of misunderstanding. “Please let me help you when you hurt. Please,” He almost begs Robbie, trying to keep him away from the mountains of bodies of people Vance used to love.

 

“I...”

 

“...Okay. I'll... try.”

"That's all I ask for."

 

As hard as it is, he doesn't cut before trying to sleep. As hard as it is.


	9. This Is Not The End

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Written in concurrence with Academy 11-20 and Fear Itself: The Home Front 1-7. 
> 
> This particular chapter has a lot of warnings for suicide ideation. Also, choking and drowning.

Robbie should get out of the Infinite Mansion more often. He only ever gets out for punishment, to go to Stamford and see his good work. 

 

And fix it, of course. To go purely for himself would be the sort of masochism he'd beat himself up for. What kind of asshole would he be? 

 

After the field trip, he hopes for a little break. What he gets is standing in a wasted lab surrounded by a bunch of Avengers, knocked out by some guy who hasn't been relevant in years. Korvac, or whatever.

 

And he's the only one who's still standing. Him and the kids, hopefully hidden away safe. And he wishes he wasn't tired, he wishes he had cut, he wishes his legs didn't tremble, but he tries to get the guy down -- of course he doesn't. That's a job for the important. For the A-listers. For the hopeful. Not for an aging loser. 

 

But he fell last. He didn't go out like he was a dragging weight.

 

And of course, since he went down last, nobody can see it was because he collapsed of his own accord. He can be a little heroic. He can talk later about how he tried so hard, fought Korvac, and someone like Clint will commiserate with him while he blusters. 

 

 

Apparently the kids got him trapped back wherever he came from. Maybe they killed him, who gives a shit? He's bad. But Robbie can see they're not celebrating. He gets the story from Hank, who got it from trying to run a group therapy with them, that they took over adult bodies of theirs and got the bodies killed and are scared of the future. 

 

 _Well, they're not wrong to be,_ is all he says.  _They're not wrong._

 

Hank looked at him with disbelief for a nanosecond before readjusting his face. 

 

"Could you help out if we ran a school dance for them?"

 

 

"... Yeah, sure."

 

 

 

 

" -- You mean I have to wear my costume?"

 

"It's in the capacity of being a teacher at a dance. Yes, you're DJing, but you should be attired properly."

 

Robbie rolls his eyes. "Vance would say it's good for me to express myself through my clothing." 

 

Tigra looks at him over the rim of reading glasses. "Why don't we let someone else express themselves?"

 

"Comeon, the kids'll probably just wear their regular outfits because they're asocial and lack normal clothes, why can't I liven it up!" Robbie's frustrated. OK, so this is his job. But why can't they have some fun, huh? That's the point. "And I don't appreciate that."

 

"Appreciate what, Robbie?" She asks, giving him the smallest level of her attention she can muster. 

 

"You think I get my freakiness outed by a student and I'm the one causing drama, don't you?" Robbie leans over her desk, pushing papers and pens to the floor. He really hates how Hot Schoolmarm she looks in the glasses. 

 

"I'm not saying that, Robbie. But I swear to God, you got to go to a therapist soon or I'm gonna get so irate you'll be on paid leave." 

 

"I'm dealing with it," he mutters. "Tiyg, please, I won't swear some skanky thing for the dance, I'll wear my.... My stupid uniform, but don't try and make me go to a therapist."

 

"I can't believe I'm striking this deal. You pick your own therapist, I won't get involved. Won't even hint to Hank." 

 

"Thanks, Tiyg. See you at the dance." He walks out of the classroom, into Vance. 

 

"Robbie, hey, any luck?"  _Uh-uh._

 

"Let me talk to her. It'd be good for you to -- "

 

"Yea, I know. But it's no biggie. I mean, this isn't my last chance ever to dress a fool. You and I get a couple nights off a week, we could go to a club maybe. It'd be fun." 

 

"I suppose..." Ugh, Vance. Never wants to do anything.

 

"I mean, or you could stay and suck face with Suzy some more, pick one." Robbie spins on his heel, intending to act as though he's got to pick playlists and mixing for the dance. He sees Vance reach, but not grab, for him. Typical V. 

 

"I don't do that, no, it's not... Are you jealous of me, of Suzy?" 

 

"No! Fuck off, man. Barely know her. You like her, you have some fun. Something a guy like you could use."

 

"...After the dance, let's hang out a bit, okay Robbie?" Vance asks in one of his more fragile voices, the ones he sets up so an angry Robbie can kick them down and break them like glass. It's a voice Robbie figures Vance perfected when he was 14. Makes him feel guilty as shit, and he probably doesn't even do it to get that reaction. 

 

"I'd love to, V. See you." 

 

 

Robbie himself never went to high school dances. He wasn't the popular type when he lived in idyllic Springfield, more of a punk, and when he started going to school in New York City he couldn't afford tickets, or he didn't have time, or who'd want to hang with some inner-city schoolyard punks when he had Warriors, you know? Going by this one he didn't miss much -- nonalcoholic punch, relationship drama, and a fist -- well, ballfight. That Hardball guy from the Initiative is the kind of punk Robbie figures should have stayed in prison. Then he reminds himself of his triple-digit bodycount to get himself back in his own lane. 

 

Everyone's getting some but him and Pietro, apparently. He watches Angel blow her stack at Vance for daring to have another relationship carefully, stays off it for the immediate future, and as soon as he's alone with Ange he gets pissed at her for acting like some sort of hot-shot my-way-or-the-highway A-lister, and she gets overwracked with guilt, and so he has to cover up his stern look and tell her it's okay, just don't do that to him. 

 

Everything's cleaned up and stuffed under the bleachers. Robbie and Vance retired to Vance's room. Robbie unwinds and Vance averts his eyes.

 

"Listen, Vance, are you okay after that thing with Angel? You throw out your back or anything?"

 

"I'm fine, Robbie. Now how's your management going? You know where you are, right?" Master of redirection, this guy. 

 

Robbie rolls his eyes before answering. "Well, I figure I'm sitting on your bed, with the news on in the background, while taking some morphine pills with MD 20/20." 

 

"Robbie -- " Vance begins. 

 

"You ask a stupid question, you get a stupid answer!" Robbie shoots back, grabs the remote, and flicks the channels. 

 

"I was concerned the loud music, the lights and all, it could have set you off." 

 

"Sorry to disappoint you, but I'm occasionally functional." He stretches out over the bed, yawning. "Look, sorry. I'm just feeling edgy. But it's a normal edgy. So, please, please, let's spend none of tonight with you are Fake Therapist, and all of it as friends." 

 

"I missed you, Robbie. As a friend. I want the best for you. I want to be there for you." Vance's voice is so earnest, but, what feeds paranoia better?

 

"Really as a friend?" 

 

"I will never, never lie to you Robbie. I want to be there. It's been like I've meeting you again, and I'm remembering... We were good friends. I want to keep that."

 

"Okay, then don't say you'll never lie," Robbie straightens up, abruptly, his body language stiff. Vance nearly slides off the pale blue quilt, to give him space. "If you'll never lie -- " 

 

" -- Then are you okay?"

 

Vance is a second faster than he should be to say yes, of course, of course. 

 

"Never lie."

 

"I won't." Vance swears, putting a hand close to Robbie's, offering it in a frustratingly detached manner. Mixed messages of affection are what his mother gave.

 

"Okay," and Robbie's hands move towards the bottom of his sweatshirt, and yank it off, not feeling anything from his body. "Am I ugly?"

 

He immediately regrets this action when he looks at Vance's eyes, gazing in a constant flux to face and body, reconciling them in his brain. 

 

"... Robbie, I've got scars myself. Just... just look," Vance wipes away some foundation from his face, a coverup he regularly applies to the stark lines he got from his dad and Gideon in such a short time, to make himself the All-American Generic Cape. 

 

"And they're different, and you know why, because they're heroic, or they're tragic, or they're anything but pathetic self-hate," Robbie hears himself say as he leans his forehead against his knees, but doesn't feel  the action of, as the effects of the alcohol really soak into his brain. He wish he wasn't sometimes a sad drunk. He wishes he was always the bouncy, charismatic one. 

 

"They're different, but they still hurt. And if they're seen, people still judge them," Vance mutters, drawing into himself without the aid of a drink. He almost never does. 

 

"I bet Suzy thinks they're hot," Robbie blurts out, and curls into the blankets. He switches the station to a cartoon marathon, those shows that get made about heroes but God knows where the money to the rights goes -- Robbie's never seen a dime from anything branded Speedball but the damn fucking reality show. 

 

They watch the show silently, and in surprise they see it's actually an episode where New Warriors show up -- a teamup between Avengers and New Warriors to fight some Big Bad Aliens, with a afterschool special sideplot about peer pressure. Cartoon Nova tries to get Cartoon Speedball and Cartoon Namorita to do something generically risky that they never name as drugs or sex or anything, because this, of course, is a children's show. 

 

By the end, they are laughing, somehow removing from their mind the raw pain of never hearing the real Namorita's voice again. They mock the voice acting and the putrid moralizing and bad animation. The next episode continues the story and has a Very Special Story about bullying. Robbie's finished the drink, but still has not put his shirt on, huddled under the covers. Vance brought out a bag of chips, which they eat with abandon despite the inevitability of crumbs. 

 

"Suzy barely looks at my body," Vance confides over a commercial break. "But she says she doesn't care." 

 

"That's a bad attitude. Not caring sucks more than bad caring."

 

Vance struggles for an answer, "Well, I care about you, I care about you a lot, and I don't like your scars, because your scars hurt you. But as part of you -- as part of you, they are part of you -- "

 

"You sure you're not drunk?"

 

"Oh, hush. They're part of you, and I accept them. I accept you."

 

How underwhelming. "Thanks." An afterthought, "I always liked you a lot." 

 

"Thanks, Robbie. Here, stay there, you're too out of it to walk back to your own bed. I'll rest in my chair."

 

"Oh, f'er goddsakes, just lay there, there's no cooties Vance!" 

 

"... If you're comfortable with that." 

 

Robbie shrug-nods. Vance's overly-considerate demeanor would be the death of him, Robbie bet. Vance waffles, for a second, about turning off the light, until he sees Robbie's trying to shield his eyes from the light, and he clicks it off, hesitantly. Robbie smiles in the dark and when Vance lies down, he grabs one of the hands so much bigger, less gnarled than his, for comfort. Vance watches him doze off, aware of how this looks, like two lost young men searching for comfort in each other.

 

It's not exactly wrong. 

 

 

But Robbie's dreams aren't comforted. And when two days later, the dinosaur kid and Tigra are burned like fries in hot oil, gnarled, and peeling, he feels no solace in having Vance's hand to squeeze tightly, and Vance cannot steal his guilt. 

 

Robbie's off to Stamford the next free day he's got. For his Penance. He does so many things of the good people of Stamford, he hardly takes a moment to himself. But he is given a moment with the mother who led the country against him, everyone unaware of the murderer in their midst but he. 

But the world has to end, right on schedule. He's discovered. They're enraged, the good people of Stamford, and he can't blame them, and he tries to stop them from attacking him, but without a whole heart, and their rage is only delayed temporarily as he drives off, but doesn't stop, some punks from the Raft. Of course he can't stop them, he's weak, he's Speedball. He's caught in the streets by the civilian militia and held down, beat down, by a mob who look at him and see fire and skulls. He thinks he let them slip the plastic bag over his head and tighten it around his neck as his breathing forces every gasp out of his chest and his vision's beginning to fade away. In the corner of his eye he sees a figure in a coat and tie, hurrying down the street, and he wants to yell _Dad, Dad,_ and maybe it's not him, but maybe it is, but he's losing any ability to think, and perhaps, perhaps,  _Stamford Butcher Killed By Mob_ should be a headline in the paper the next day.  _  
_

But it isn't. The mother who hates him saves him. The mother who hates he looks him in the eyes. Miriam Sharpe, the name rolls around in his mouth, certain his dad knew her. The mother who hates him for killing her child tells him he must fight the monsters appearing, like some narrator directing him in a video game. He nods, and is gone. 

 

Maybe he is trying to kill himself. He'd really go for the  _fucking Juggernaut?_ He really is. Because it's Bumblefuck Midwest and nobody cares about Bumblefuck Midwest. He drives it -- that thing isn't even Cain anymore -- away from the town and wants to collapse, but he can't, because what if a child died? What if? 

 

And he calls out to be taken to the next Ground Zero, not DC, not Broxton, not New York, somewhere alone. He finds himself on the fragmented coast of Newfoundland, in St. John's Bay, and briefly he deliriously wonders if he's going to be in trouble with Customs and Immigration. But then he see scared people, people who aren't scared of him but need him. He briefly considers moving to Canada to escape bad press. He pushes back Attuma -- or whatever has Attuma -- far away, using all his clever math learning that he swore he'd never need before Speedball bounced into his life. Evacuation is the name of the next game.

 

He's a single man. 

 

There are 100,000 people in St. John's. 

 

 

 

After the second wave hits, that figure is significantly lower. 

He chokes on the second time in hours, water filling his lungs and he thinks,  _Speedball  Killed In St. John's While Leading Evacuation_ is an okay headline. But he sees people dying, all in front of him, and St. John's becomes a watery grave when Stamford is a burning one. He forces the water out of his lungs, choking on the pressure the kinetic energy puts on him, and sweating the pressure the wave put on him.

 

The wave was of course, his fault. He just pushed Attuma back. He didn't stop him. 

He tries to save the city. Some of the city is saving itself. Jocasta, the 'bot, sends tons of those better-than-him 'bot bodies out to save more people in minutes than he ever has. 

 

He sees a girl with a camera taking pictures of Jocasta rescuing an older gentleman. 

"Hey, maybe a shot of that guy over there pulling those kids out of the water would be good?" 

 

There are pictures. There's recordings. There's videos. Robbie tries to stay out of the shutter's view, though a few apparent fans insisted on filming him. He feels an eerie recollection to the reality show, but this -- it has to be different, right? 

 

This is to remind people we're alive. We're alive. Go help your neighbor. You're alive. Yet visions of narcissism dance in his head, him crouched at a computer watching for compliments in the video comments, hungry for approval. 

 

When he walks away from St. John's, he tilts his chin down just a little low. He wipes a little blood that trickled from his ear in the Midwest away. He goes to Stamford. 

 

_And fucking Nazis have taken over._

 

He's getting really tired of being beat over the head and choked.  _Nazi Nuns Assassinate Former Warrior in Stamford_ is just lame. But his muscles ache. He sees one of the stupid, gimmicky, Sisters of Sin twirling a butterfly knife wet with blood on it. Held hostage by them, bleary, he wants to lean and ask her to cut him up, just the arms, maybe the back, make him feel a release, just carve it in, c'mon...

 

He has no memory of the Sisters of Sin's last moments ruling suburbia. Absolutely none. You could quiz him on so many things from before he first lost his memories and mind to brainwashing and he'd now recall them, but an account of the final Fight of Stamford in the Serpent War would get you a blank look, a cough, and nothing more. 

 

But he helped end it. He knew nothing, throughout, about any of why this happened -- that was what A-listers know. He was just running around, trying to save people, an emergency worker who didn't understand why they needed help, only that they did. 

 

The mother who hated him didn't hate him. But she didn't love him either. 

 

He quietly helped at the vigil, but he did not stay. He had no communications with any Avengers, much less Jocasta -- she'd gone radio dead just before he left St. John's. 

 

He once, as a teenager, pissed off at his Dad, walked to New York City to go do things he was too young to do, determined to stick it to the Man by not turning on his powers. It took him 8 and a half hours, an amazing speed for such a scrawny kid

 

He made it to Avengers Mansion in about 11 this time, as the sun was high in the sky. He stumbled to the gate, and it let him in without a test of defenses, or mettle, or whatnot. 

 

Robbie saw Vance, and his arms spread wide to catch Robbie, as if he had sensed young, little Robbie coming home.  The Academy teachers, and students, crowded around him, amazed him him. He vomited up some feelgood line to defer any praise for him to the civilians. And then he said, no more. I am not a teacher anymore.

Hank let him go.

 

He found out what happened to the Infinite Mansion, and discovered nearly all his personal belongings had been destroyed with it-- they found a few photos, a few clothes, a book, a pack of cards, and a videotape, NW-PILOT-2-00-5-10 taylor fndation copy 3, snapped in half.  

 

And his cat. 

 

He laughed. He was put up for the night in an old bedroom of the Wasp's, with a prime view of the park, and was told to ask for anything he needed. He washed and was cared for, and complimented by more Avengers than turned their gaze away, and ate a good meal, Jarvis kind as he was to make it, and he smoked while scratching Niels' ears, blowing balls of smoke in puffs out onto Central Park. Who'd yell at him for a cigarette? It was pleasant, and quiet, for New York City. 

 

He wasn't sure where he was going to go to. No family, Rage at school... He supposed he'd find a crappy apartment okay with Niels and stay there. Or maybe he'd run away. To Canada. Find Timeslip in California and beg her to take him back. Go to New Zealand. 

 

He tried to leave quietly around 2 am, when he saw the capes on monitor duty run out for something. Vance met him at the door. And he talked, and talked, and really embodied his good and caring nature, that everyone loves in him, and made Robbie feel just a second as though he wasn't running out alone. 

 

And then he wasn't. 

 

 

But he still cries. He still shudders unpleasantly and rakes his skin with untrimmed nails with nervous duty. He still goes dark and fearful when he chokes on a bite of fast food they picked up on the road.

 

But the road is shorter now. 

 


End file.
